Matthew Wright

Matthew Wright died on October 30, 2026, while working remotely in Los Angeles. He was 52. News of his death was first shared with the public through a GoFundMe campaign organised by his family, who called it an unfathomable tragedy and said they were raising money to cover the costs of bringing him home, holding a funeral and arranging a memorial. No cause of death has been made public.

At the time of his death, Wright's husband, Justin, his father, his sister and his niece were in New York, and the family said they were desperate to be reunited with him for a proper goodbye. The GoFundMe also noted that Wright and Justin had both been laid off from their jobs earlier in the summer of 2026, which added to the financial pressure the family faced in arranging his funeral.

Ellen DeGeneres learned of Wright's death and addressed it publicly on Instagram on November 2, three days after he died. In an emotional video she said she and Wright had just started working on a new project together and struggled to hold back tears as she called him funny, kind and smart, and said he would always be the glue to our entire family at the Ellen Show.

Andy Lassner, who worked alongside Wright as an executive producer on The Ellen DeGeneres Show and now holds the same role on The Jennifer Hudson Show, posted his own tribute. He said he had seen Wright on the set of The Jennifer Hudson Show during its Halloween episode just hours before Wright died, and described him as a brilliant producer and an even better human being. Lassner also recalled the devotion Wright showed his mother, flying between Los Angeles and New York nearly every weekend before her death.

As of this writing, no date has been announced for a funeral or public memorial service. The GoFundMe campaign set up to support Wright's family remained active and had raised roughly half of its fifty thousand dollar goal within the first day of being shared publicly.

Matthew Wright, known to friends and colleagues as Matt, was born in 1973 or 1974 and grew up with close family ties to New York, where his father, sister and niece were living at the time of his death. He studied at the State University of New York at New Paltz, where he earned a bachelor's degree in communication and media studies, according to his professional profile.

Details of his childhood have not been widely published. Those who knew him later spoke of how deeply he cared for his family, and in particular of his devotion to his mother in the final period of her life.

Wright joined the production team of The Ellen DeGeneres Show in August 2006 and stayed with the programme until it ended in 2022. Over those sixteen years he worked his way up from producer through senior, supervising and co-executive producer roles to executive producer. He helped develop the games, comedy bits and audience surprises that became some of the show's most widely shared moments, and he became a familiar face to viewers himself through frequent appearances in sketches and pranks alongside Ellen DeGeneres. As part of the show's team he shared in multiple Emmy Awards.

Alongside the daily talk show he worked on several spin-offs from the Ellen stable, including a spell as supervising producer on the NBC primetime series Ellen's Game of Games between 2017 and 2020 and work on Ellen's Greatest Night of Giveaways in 2019. He also helped develop the pilot and test run of the syndicated talk show Bethenney in 2012.

When the Ellen show ended, Wright spent close to a year as a consulting producer on The Jennifer Hudson Show, helping to launch it in 2022. In August 2023 he became senior supervising producer of The Drew Barrymore Show in New York. He and his husband were both laid off in the summer of 2026, and at the time of his death he and DeGeneres had just begun planning a new project together.

Wright was married to Justin, whom he described as having met thanks to the Ellen show. When the programme ended in 2022 he wrote that over sixteen years he had made many of his best friends there and had even fallen in love because of it.

Friends remembered him as generous and funny. Andy Lassner, a fellow Ellen executive producer, recalled that Wright flew between Los Angeles and New York practically every weekend to look after his mother before she died. Wright was also a close friend of Stephen "tWitch" Boss, the show's DJ, who died in 2022.

Wright is remembered as one of the producers who gave The Ellen DeGeneres Show its playful character over most of its nineteen seasons, both behind the camera and in the comic segments he appeared in. Ellen DeGeneres said he was and always would be the glue to the show's entire family, and Lassner called him a brilliant producer and an even better human being.

Tributes also came from across daytime television, including from comedian Loni Love, former co-host of The Real, who described him as talented, sweet and always game for anything. A GoFundMe campaign set up by his family to bring him home to New York and pay for a funeral and memorial raised around half of its 50,000 dollar goal on its first day.