Barry Blaustein, the former Saturday Night Live writer who helped define Eddie Murphy’s years on the show—and then went on to co-write several of Murphy’s biggest film comedies—has died. He was 72.
Blaustein joined SNL in 1980, the same season Murphy arrived as a featured player, and quickly became part of the writing partnership most closely associated with Murphy’s breakout characters. Working with David Sheffield, Blaustein helped create or shape such now-classic bits as Buckwheat, Gumby, Mr. Robinson, James Brown’s Celebrity Hot Tub, and Velvet Jones.
Blaustein and Sheffield rose to supervising producers before leaving SNL in 1984, but their association with Murphy continued for decades. The pair co-wrote Coming to America, The Nutty Professor, Nutty Professor II: The Klumps, and Coming 2 America.
Their late-night story had an unexpected encore when Murphy returned to host SNL in 2019, and brought Blaustein and Sheffield back with him. In a 2024 interview with LateNighter’s Mark Malkoff, current SNL head writer Streeter Seidell recalled the pair’s return that week.
“They wrote some stuff,” Seidell said. “They were so nice… They didn’t come in like, ‘It’s our show, we’re Eddie’s guys.’ They were very, they’re just like, ‘Hey, this is so cool to be back here, man. This is fun.’”
Murphy’s 2019 episode became SNL’s most-watched installment since 2008—a fitting coda for two writers whose work helped launch one of the show’s most electric eras.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Blaustein died Tuesday at his Los Angeles home after being diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer last month. He had also reportedly been living with Parkinson’s disease since 2017.
