Being a cast member in the early 1980s on Saturday Night Live and having successful stand-up acts helped Eddie Murphy's career greatly, but he truly rose to prominence for his lead role in films like Beverly Hills Cop and Coming to America. However, the idea for Beverly Hills Cop took years to come to fruition, and the search for the ideal Axel Foley wasn't an easy one, with Murphy being merely one contender for the brash Detroit-based cop.
Several early contenders for the role included James Caan, Richard Pryor and even Al Pacino. However, another famous Italian actually landed the part. Sylvester Stallone became a household name after he penned the script for Rocky in merely three days and starred in the lead role, and he rode that success to nab the lead role in Beverly Hills Cop.
Sly was likely hired due to his previous success as the protagonist in both the Rocky and Rambo films, but it wasn't smooth sailing after he joined the production of Beverly Hills Cop. Due to his previous experience as an accomplished writer, he had more than a few suggestions for the script. And with his reputation as an action star, Stallone wanted to transform the comedic film into a drastically more violent picture.
Stallone even went as far as watching to change the character's name from Axel Foley to Axel Cobretti, which later inspired his character Lieutenant Cobretti in the 1986 Cobra. But all the changes Stallone hoped for the film drove the budget "higher than Paramount wanted to spend on the picture." So, after some consideration from the studio, Stallone's contract was terminated just two weeks before filming on Beverly Hills Cop started.
Frankly, Beverly Hills Cop doesn't seem like a film Stallone would be gung-ho about due to its buddy cop comedy nature and lack of massive explosions and Lamborghinis, which is what the actor wanted his character to ride in. In fact, if Stallone had had his way, the opening scene would have looked like "Saving Private Ryan on the beaches of Normandy."
While Eddie Murphy later received fame for Coming to America and his eventual voice-acting role as Mushu in Mulan, he first received comedic recognition as the fast-talking Axel Foley, and he was also a large part of the franchise getting to the heights it did. And that was for the best because had Stallone stayed on the project, the buddy cop films would have been an unmemorable action film franchise without its iconic humorous flair.