Nicola Cuti

Born on October 29, 1944, Nicola Cuti — who worked professionally as Nick Cuti — built one of the more quietly versatile careers in American comics over five decades. He died on February 21, 2020.

Cuti came to comics as both a writer and artist, eventually expanding into editing, and his range extended well beyond the page: he worked as an animation background designer, magazine illustrator, screenwriter, and science-fiction novelist. That breadth of visual and narrative training is reflected in the variety of titles he touched, from the horror anthology *Midnight Tales* and the ghost-story staple *Haunted* to licensed work on *Popeye* and DC's retrospective *The Best of DC*.

His most enduring contribution is almost certainly *E-Man*, the good-humored superhero series he co-created with artist Joe Staton. The character's warmth and wit set it apart from grimmer contemporaries, and the partnership with Staton proved a natural one. Cuti also conceived several other original characters during this period, including Moonchild, Captain Cosmos, and Starflake the Cosmic Sprite.

Across a career logged between 1968 and 2020, Cuti accumulated credits as writer, artist, inker, colorist, and letterer on nearly two hundred issues — a span that speaks to his comfort working at virtually every stage of the comics-making process. His legacy rests most firmly on *E-Man*, a title that has retained genuine affection among readers who encountered it during its original run.