Eddie Murphy Named AFI Life Achievement Award Honouree For 2025
Eddie Murphy will receive the American Film Institute life achievement award at a Los Angeles gala, honoring his decades of impact in film, television, and comedy.
Eddie Murphy will be honoured with one of Hollywood’s most prestigious recognitions next year, as the American Film Institute announced that he will receive its Life Achievement Award. The tribute ceremony is scheduled for April 18 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.
Kathleen Kennedy, chair of the AFI Board of Trustees, said the organisation is celebrating an artist whose impact stretches across generations. “Eddie Murphy is an American icon,” she noted. “A trailblazing force in the art forms of film, television, and stand-up comedy, his versatility knows no bounds.”
Murphy, now 64, has remained a dominant figure in entertainment since launching his career as a teenage stand-up comic. His rise accelerated during his years on “Saturday Night Live”, which paved the way for a string of box-office successes, including Beverly Hills Cop, Coming to America, The Nutty Professor,r and the Shrek franchise. His performance in Dreamgirls earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor in 2007, along with a Golden Globe and a Screen Actors Guild Award.
The actor reflects on his long career in the new Netflix documentary Being Eddie. Discussing his Oscar loss, he shared that the ceremony itself was a bigger nuisance than the outcome. “It’s always wonderful to win stuff, but if I don’t win, I don’t give a,” he said. “I’m still Eddie in the morning.”
Murphy received the Cecil B. DeMille Award at the Golden Globes in 2023. Speaking to The Associated Press two years earlier, he said age and experience have given him a new outlook. “You take everything for granted when you’re young, how successful I was,” he said. “Now I take nothing for granted and appreciate everything.”
AFI’s Life Achievement Award has been presented since 1973 and is regarded as one of the institution’s highest honours. Murphy becomes its 51st recipient, joining recent honourees such as Nicole Kidman, Julie Andrews, and Denzel Washington. The organisation’s annual tribute dinners are known for drawing major Hollywood names; last year’s celebration for Francis Ford Coppola saw appearances from Steven Spielberg, Robert De Niro, and Harrison Ford.