Dave Chappelle is back and in my opinion the world is a better place for it. This step back into the limelight sees a more mature, steady and wise man adorning our screens, and from what I have seen, he is still funny as hell!
Chappelle has a reflectiveness to him now, an aged approach and a refined wit that may lose some of his sillier past but create a comedian and a mind that is match for the messed up things happening today.
He recently sat down with host Gayle King for an interview on CBS This Morning and talked honestly about his departure from the spotlight and from the Dave Chappelle Show.
CBS Reported:
“I was talkin’ to a guy… he basically said to me that comedy is a reconciliation of paradox,” Chappelle told “CBS This Morning” co-host Gayle King. “And I think that that was a irreconcilable moment for me. That I was in this very successful place, but the emotional content of it didn’t feel anything like what I imagined success should feel like. It just didn’t feel right.”
Chappelle’s now back, this time with a three-part stand-up comedy special on Netflix, premiering Tuesday.
But Chappelle revealed he does miss his former show. “But ‘Chappelle’s Show’s’ like breakin’ up with a girl and you still like her. But in your mind you’re like, ‘That b**** is crazy. I’m not goin’ back,’” Chappelle said, chuckling.
Chappelle not only left the show, walking away from a $50 million deal, but he also left the country, going to South Africa to escape.
“Did the fame scare you?” King asked.
“Fame, yeah, but not so much that I get on a plane to Africa. Fame is not that kind of scary. But it is – fame is a horrifying concept when it’s aimed at you, you know?” Chappelle said. “At the end of the day, it’s so – you don’t have that much control over it. You just try to conduct yourself as best you can.”
For two seasons his best was Comedy Central’s “Chappelle’s Show.” It was critically acclaimed and wildly popular.
“Even when you walked away in 2005, you were still working. It’s just that we didn’t know all the things that you were doing. You really stayed low,” King said.
“I found an altitude I was comfortable with. I found a way that – to do what I liked to do and avoid some of the parts of it that I was uncomfortable with,” Chappelle said.
“What were you uncomfortable with?” King asked.
“Well, I mean, if you look at me, right, physically – now, I’m, like, 40 pounds heavier than I was when I did ‘Chappelle’s Show.’ And people are like, ‘How did you gain all that weight?’ By resting and eatin’ and payin’ attention to myself. I have actual relationships with my kids,” Chappelle said. “I’ve been all over the country, touring all my life. But I never saw anything. Now I’ve seen everything. I could talk to people or I could – I had time to stop if someone said they liked me. It wasn’t like I brushed past ‘em like, ‘I don’t want to hear it.’ I had time to stop like, ‘You do?’ You know what I mean? It’s like – it was just, like, the way that I engaged the world was different.”
Read more and watch the video at CBS News here.
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