FIRST OFF . . .

A $10-million copyright infringement suit has been filed against Eddie Murphy, his production companies and several other individuals by a Canadian screenwriter, who claims Murphy and others stole his idea for the new movie, “Coming to America.” In his U.S. District Court suit filed in Los Angeles, Shelby M. Gregory, who now lives in Hollywood, said he believes that Murphy and Paramount Pictures swiped the idea for “Coming to America” from one Lassine Ousseni, who Gregory alleges stole it from his copyrighted treatment titled “Toto, the African Prince.” A Paramount spokeswoman said the company does not comment on matters in litigation. In his suit, Gregory claims that he was offered $5,000 for his treatment by Ousseni, who represented himself as a film producer and actor when they met in early 1983. But Gregory was never paid, even though Ousseni subsequently submitted the story to Murphy’s production company as a “new” screenplay, which Murphy passed on. Gregory alleges that “Coming to America” is based on this screenplay. Meanwhile, “Coming to America,” in its first day of wide release Wednesday, took in a royal $3,780,155 at 2,064 box offices nationally.