Eddie Murphy shares surprising birthday story in new documentary

Eddie Murphy is looking back at one of the most surprising moments from his early fame.

In Netflix’s new documentary, Being Eddie, the American actor shares a shocking memory involving a Hollywood icon who made him an unexpected offer at his 21st birthday party.

“Nobody had as much fun as we had in the '80s. Nobody,” Murphy said.

He explains that he celebrated his 21st birthday at the famous Studio 54 and during the party, legendary actor Yul Brynner approached him with his wife.

According to the comedian, “Yul Brynner, from ‘The Ten Commandments,’ he was with his wife, and he was like, ‘How would you like to go back to my apartment with my wife and I and party?’”

Murphy said he turned him down immediately. “Nah, I'm cool,” he told the Oscar winner at the time. But years later, he realized there may have been more to the invitation than he first understood.

“I got older, I was like, party?” The Pick Up actor says in the documentary, adding, “His wife was smiling. I was like, ‘Did he want me to go f--- his wife?’ I was like, what the? When I got older, I thought back on it.”

Looking back now, Murphy jokes that he sometimes wishes the story had gone differently. “Now I wish I would've went… ‘Yeah, I went back to Yul Brynner's spot and f---ed his wife… He was going, 'Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera,’” he said, referencing Brynner’s famous line.

The documentary includes many other personal memories. The 64-year-old star said that even though he joined Saturday Night Live right out of high school and was surrounded by wild nightlife, he kept his distance. 

“I just wasn't with it,” he recalled.

Eddie Murphy added in the documentary that he never tried cocaine, didn’t drink or smoke cigarettes, and “never smoked a joint until I was 30 years old.”