The idea for a sequel to Beverly Hills Cop by a Paramount executive turned out to be an incredible success for Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock.
Franchise Beverly Hills Cop ventured to take Speed for the general public. According to former Paramount Vice President of Production Don Granger, the project Speedoriginally born as continuation of the detective saga with Eddie Murphy before Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock took over the lead roles.
During the latest episode of Chris Tapley’s 50 mph speed podcast, Granger revealed that negotiations led to him pitching the script as a script for a movie. Beverly Hills Cop III.
“I really wanted to try making a movie, and my last desperate attempt was to pitch it to our president’s dinner as a possible script for Beverly Hills Cop 3.Granger said. “I had about 15 minutes of uncertainty before it was canceled because the assignment was to find a Beverly Hill III cop. So I thought, ‘Let’s put Axel Foley on the bus.'”.
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Rejection of Keanu Reeves at Speed 2
Rejected by Paramount in 1994 Speed became a blockbuster for 20th Century Fox in 1994, which entrusted Jan de Bont to direct. The film spawned a sequel, 1997’s Speed 2, for which Sandra Bullock admitted she was still ashamed of the past year: “I have said this very clearly. It didn’t make sense. This is a film I wish I never made.”
Unlike Sandra Bullock, Keanu Reeves has explained several times why he refused to do Speed 2, despite the original film’s box office success and winning an Oscar for Best Sound Editing and Best Sound Mixing. Reeves later revealed that 20th Century Fox put him on “movie banishment” for saying “no” and replaced him with Jason Patric as the new love interest of Sandra Bullock’s character.