Brooklyn Nine-Nine’s Andre Braugher has passed away at the age of 61
It is time for the 99th Precinct to say goodbye to Andre Braugher.
The actor—who portrayed Captain Raymond Holt on Brooklyn Nine-Nine from 2013 to 2021—died on Dec. 11 following a sudden illness, his death confirmed to E! News. He was 61.
Further details on his cause of death have not been shared.
His co-stars were among those to mourn the loss, with Terry Crews writing on Instagram Dec. 12, “Cannot believe you are gone so soon. I’m honored to have known you, laughed with you, worked with you and shared 8 beautiful years witnessing your irreplaceable talent. This hurts. You left us too soon.”
Born in Chicago, Braugher studied at Juilliard before entering Hollywood during a time when roles for African American actors were “few and far between,” he told the Associated Press in 2019. He scored his breakout role in the 1989 film Glory alongside Morgan Freeman and Denzel Washington, but it was four years later that he rose to fame playing detective Frank Pembleton in Homicide: Life on the Street. As well as earning an Emmy for the role, Homicide was a special moment in his career, as he was able to co-star with his wife Ami Brabson, who he had married in 1991.
As a crime show alum, Braugher may have seemed a natural fit to play the strict police captain on Brooklyn Nine-Nine almost 2 decades later. However, the actor was admittedly hesitant to step back into the uniform and make the transition into comedy.
“Everything’s new. I’d never done it before. Am I any good?” Braugher recalled of his thought process to Variety in 2020. “I remember turning to my wife and asking her, ‘Is this funny?’ And she said, ‘Yes, absolutely, you are not being deluded.’ But I kept looking at it, saying to myself, is this funny? I couldn’t really decide.”
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But according to co-star Andy Samberg, Braugher already had the comedic chops to play the stone-faced police captain.
“He has gotten even better as the seasons have gone on,” Samberg told Variety. “And really often when he’s worried that a funny story is sacrificing the larger truth, his instincts are correct.”
For Braugher, playing law enforcement characters for years made him question how police are perceived, particularly following the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor in 2020.
“I look up at all these decades of playing these characters,” he told the outlet. “I, too, have fallen prey to the mythology that’s been built up… It’s almost like the air you breathe or the water that you swim in. It’s hard to see.”
He believed the public had developed views about police from the various procedural shows they see on TV, noting, “That is something that we will have to collectively address—all cop shows.”
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When he left the badge behind at the end of each day, Braugher stepped back into his role as father to 3 grown sons with Brabson, who he called “like-minded” because of growing up in similar neighborhoods.
