A couple of months ago, I feared that the Eddie Murphy we all grew up loving was forever gone when he backed out of Bill Condon's Richard Pryor biopic.  However, we have some good and bad news tonight that might give some of us old school Murphy fans some hope.  The good news is that Murphy is producing and may star in an R-rated comedy, The Misadventures of Fluffy.  This comes as a surprise since this would be his first R-rated film since 1999's underrated Life.  The bad news is that this film will feature talking animals like 1998's Dr. Doolittle.  Hit the jump to learn all the details of news both good and bad.

THR's Risky Business Blog reports that the once-amazing comedian is attached to produce and possibly star in The Misadventures of Fluffy for Paramount.  The project was bought by the studio based on a pitch by newcomers Sam Pitman and Adam Cole-Kelly. Now I don't know how exactly they pitched Fluffy but THR describes it as being "a road trip pic through New York featuring talking animals, and with an element of social comedy reminiscent of Murphy's 1980's hit Trading Places," which sounds both unoriginal and depressing.

I'm still waiting for Murphy to go back to his roots and make a comeback some day.  Despite my lack of excitementfor this project, I do think it's a step in the right direction.  I will take an R-rated Eddie Murphy film, even if it does have talking animals, over his recent, unbearable family films any day.

Speaking of those, you can hear Murphy's voice in Shrek Forever After and see him in A Thousand Words next year.