The Age of Spin: Dave Chappelle Live at the Hollywood Palladium (2017) Movie Script
1
This is Dave.
He tells dirty jokes for a living.
That stare is where most
of his hard work happens.
It signifies a profound train of thought,
the alchemist's fire
that transforms fear and tragedy
into levity and livelihood.
Dave calls that look "the trance."
Thank you! Thank you very much!
Thank you all.
Oh, wow.
That was exciting, wasn't it?
Thank you, guys.
Have a seat, feel comfortable, relax.
I want to thank everyone in LA
for a wonderful week.
It's been great here.
You know what? It's been ten years
since the last time I played Los Angeles,
if you can imagine.
I know! I know, I've been gone
for a very long time.
And unbeknownst to you,
it was a difficult ten years.
I'm not gonna take you
through all the agony I've been through,
but it was tough.
Some of it you might've seen.
I don't know if you ever saw on TMZ
the big headline:
"Dave Chappelle Drunk Onstage in Detroit."
Well, if you saw it, I wasn't drunk.
I had smoked some reefer...
with some rappers.
Yeah. I don't know if you know anything
about hanging out with rappers,
but their weed is very strong,
stronger than I what I was accustomed to.
The article goes on
to say I was booed offstage,
which is also incorrect.
I was booed.
I did not leave.
It was a long bomb.
It was a fucking nightmare.
Two puffs of weed, that's all it was.
Two puffs.
I never had that happen,
where I take two puffs of weed,
I looked at the guy next to me,
I was like, "I'm gonna bomb, nigga.
I can feel it."
And that guy called my name.
"Dave Chappelle!"
Niggas was like...
Normally, when you do a comedy show...
you guys don't know what it looks like
up here,
but niggas be just looking up
at you like...
That's how the show started.
Didn't take long for their faces
to switch up like, "What the fuck?"
They started looking amongst themselves.
So I knew I wasn't doing good.
I don't remember what I was saying.
It just took one person to break the ice.
It was a black lady
with a Ford Motor shirt on.
Stood up suddenly.
"Fuck you, Dave Chappelle!"
I said, "Excuse me?"
She said, "I worked all week
for this shit, and this show sucks!"
And in a weird act of racial harmony,
a conservative white guy stood up
and backed her up.
"Yeah!"
The whole crowd banded together
and started chanting,
"We want our money back!
We want our money back!"
I said, "Oh, shit." I snapped out of it.
"Good people of Detroit, hear me.
Hear me now.
You will never get
your fucking money back."
Fuck that.
I said, "I'm like Evel Knievel.
I get paid for the attempt.
I didn't promise this shit would be good."
"Boo!" They said, "Fuck you!"
This went on for a long time.
And then, after the show, I felt so bad,
I took half of the money from the show...
thousands of dollars...
I said, "I'm gonna give this to charity."
You know what I did?
I bought $25,000 worth of bubble gum
and drove around Detroit
and handed it out to the homeless
so they could chew it
and still be hungry.
I was very mad at Detroit that night.
Because not only did I bomb,
I had to go back to the very same room
the next night and do it all over again.
Fucking nightmare. That would be like
if you were having sex with a woman
and, for some reason...
this would never happen...
but for some reason,
she had a mousetrap in her pussy.
You get caught in the trap.
And then you've got to fuck her again
tomorrow night.
I'd still do it,
but I'd be careful the next time.
The old mousetrap-in-the-pussy trick, eh?
Fool me once.
Yeah. Yeah, it was a tough time.
And I wanted to give up sometimes.
I almost did give up,
but then, right before I gave up,
I decided not to.
But I made the call.
They answered the phone.
"Hello? Dancing with the Stars."
I said, "Not yet.
Not yet."
Yeah.
If you see me on that shit, it's over.
Trust me. My spirit is broken.
If you see me waiting for them judges...
getting critiqued on my cha-cha,
fuck that.
I've been hanging out in...
I haven't been working in LA,
but I come out here and hang out and shit.
I was out here a few weeks ago.
I almost got arrested.
I'm not bullshitting.
This happens to a lot of black people.
What happened was...
I was coming out of one
of those nightclubs in Hollywood,
and my friend saw me.
I guess I was wobbling or something.
So, he just rolled up.
He's a good friend of mine.
He's like, "Hey, Dave, give me the keys."
I was like, "All right, nigga,
just take the keys."
And I got in the passenger's side
of my car, and he drove it.
It was fine. Just talking, chopping it up.
And then, on the 10,
the blue-and-whites hit us.
Now, I should tell you,
the friend that was driving me was black,
which really doesn't have anything to do
with the story
other than to let you know
there was fear in the car.
Not my fear. I'm black,
but I'm also Dave Chappelle.
So, I figured, you know,
shit will probably be fine.
Traffic stop started off
on the right foot.
The cops came up to the driver's side.
"Hi. How are you guys doing tonight?"
And he recognized me immediately.
"Oh. Dave Chappelle."
And I looked at my friend like,
"We're getting out of this shit."
And then he says,
"You guys were swerving in the lane.
Do you mind just stepping out of the car
for a second?"
Still no cause for alarm.
I looked through the rearview mirror.
The body language of the arrest
looked good.
Just talking.
So, then I started fucking with the radio.
You know a traffic stop is going good
if you're listening to the radio
when someone else is outside of the car.
But then, when I looked back
in the rearview mirror,
something had gone horribly wrong.
That motherfucker was back there like...
And the next thing I knew, they were
stuffing him in the back of the car,
and I thought what anybody would think
in a situation like that:
"Oh, my God.
What is gonna happen to me?"
And the police walked up to the window.
"Mr. Chappelle,
we had to arrest your friend.
He refused to take our breathalyzer test."
I said, "That motherfucker.
Not complying? That's odd.
So, officer, what's gonna happen to me?"
"You're fine. We're just gonna have to
ask you to step out of the car
so we can impound the vehicle,
and we'll arrange for you
to have a ride home."
I said, "Oh, well, no.
I would rather you just give me the keys."
He said, "Mr. Chappelle,
your friend already told us
he's your designated driver.
We can't let you drive in this condition."
I was like, "No, nigga, I'm good."
And then suddenly,
the shit turned into Vegas.
He was like...
"I'll let you blow for it."
I said, "Excuse me?"
He said,
"If you blow in my breathalyzer..."
I said, "Oh, nigga, I thought
you was trying to get your dick sucked.
What's the...
Whew!
Whew!"
"If you blow in my breathalyzer and pass,
I'll give you the keys to the car."
I said, "Uh...
set 'em up, nigga. Let's play."
And I blew in that thing.
And it made a noise. "Beep!"
I said, "Uh-oh."
And he looked at it. He said,
"Oh, well, Mr. Chappelle,
I guess you're free to go."
I said, "I am?"
I didn't know that thing
didn't pick up weed.
I drove home on the 10
30 miles an hour.
Yeah, it all worked out.
It all worked out.
I'm one of the lucky ones. It doesn't
work out that well for everybody.
I saw that videotape of that lady
that got beat up in LA in traffic.
You see that shit on rush hour traffic?
They beat a black woman's ass.
This woman didn't even do anything wrong.
It's fucked up. It was so fucked up,
it didn't even go to court.
The City of L.A. just gave that woman
$1.5 million for her pain and suffering.
That is not bad,
considering that's the same amount
of money that Marcos Maidana made
to fight Floyd Mayweather
the second time.
And this woman obviously hasn't trained
a day in her life.
You can see it on the tape.
She didn't come to fight.
Her guards were low.
She was taking a lot of shots.
Everybody's mad at police now.
I watched that...
You see that shit on Netflix,
Making a Murderer?
The Steven Avery story.
If you haven't seen it, check it out.
Steven Avery is in more trouble
than any white person
in the history of the United States
has ever been in!
In a justice system designed
for him to thrive,
he's failed miserably twice.
I can't even wrap my mind around it.
If Making a Murderer
was about a black dude,
that shit would be called Duh!
Of course everything would go wrong.
Seems like he did it, all right.
The motherfucker even had $200,000
for his legal defense.
That should get you off in Wisconsin.
That's like OJ money.
All he needed to get off
that he didn't have
was a single black juror.
That's all it would've took.
Because only a black dude
in the United States
can look at 11 other dudes and be like,
"I think the police did this shit."
He's fucked up in the game.
That's how OJ got off.
I've been watching that new OJ show.
I can't get enough of that shit.
Doesn't it bring back good memories?
But I forgot just how polarizing
that OJ case was.
And you know, I've met OJ Simpson
on four different occasions in my life.
And before the end of the show,
I will tell you about each
of those occasions.
The first time I met OJ Simpson,
I was in Santa Monica.
- Santa Monica!
- Yeah!
I can't believe a black dude was like,
"Santa Monica!"
You the last nigga I would expect
to say that.
Let me see your shoes.
You got some Vans on, nigga? What you got?
"Santa Monica!"
You?
At the time, I was 18.
I had done a show,
and the guy from the club came up
and was like, "Hey, OJ Simpson's here,
and he said he wants to meet you."
I said, "What? Fuck yeah!"
I ran down the steps,
and OJ was down there.
He's like, "Hey, young man. How are you?
It's very good to meet you.
And you're doing really good work,
and I hope good things happen for you
in your life."
I was like, "Man, thanks, Mr. Juice."
Standing beside him, was...
I don't know the nice way to say this...
his soon-to-be-slain wife.
Ohh!
Ladies and gentlemen, man the fuck up,
or you're not gonna make it
to the end of this show.
Just man the fuck up.
She's dead.
We already know what happened.
We don't know who did it,
but we know what happened.
I should tell you,
that woman was very nice to me.
She actually embraced me.
She said, "I think you're adorable,"
and she hugged me.
She goes, "Good luck to you,"
and she held me for a long time.
And I whispered in her ear, "Bitch,
are you trying to get us both killed?"
I'm just kidding.
I didn't say that, but...
that was the first time,
in a nutshell.
It's good to see so many...
so many different people here
from so many different ethnicities.
Very diverse crowd.
Looks like you thought Bernie Sanders
was gonna come out in this motherfucker.
But... surprise!
It's me.
Yeah.
Yeah, you know, I'm happy, really,
to see black people come.
A lot of black people don't fuck
with me like they used to.
But there's a few reasons
you don't see black people at my shows.
One is because, obviously, black people
have slower Internet connections.
I mean, that would be my guess.
I don't know what...
Actually, my own actions drew a wedge
between me and the community
I hold so dear.
A couple of weeks ago,
I was supposed to be in Flint, Michigan,
for a charity benefit that was supposed
to raise awareness
for the appalling condition
of the water in Flint.
I don't know if you know this,
but the water in Flint
is fucking poisonous.
It's actually making people sick.
Hollywood people are like,
"So what? At least they have water."
But this water...
this water is fucked up.
So, a lot of black celebrities flew
into Flint,
and they did a tremendous charity benefit,
and I was on the schedule to appear.
Uh...
So, the reason a lot of people
haven't heard about this benefit...
it was the same day as the Oscars.
Right, I know. So, I was on my way
to the airport to go to Flint,
and then Chris Rock calls me
and is like,
"Hey, Dave, I got a ticket for you
for the Oscars. Can you make it?"
And I was like, "Sure, nigga.
I'm on my way to the airport right now."
Come on, man.
What am I gonna do about that water?
What am I, a fucking superhero?
I need to have fun. I need to live, too!
I didn't fuck that water up!
Stevie Wonder was there.
They didn't need me.
I'm sorry, everybody.
I'd never been to the Oscars.
You've seen the movies I make.
I was excited.
I knew I was gonna get into some trouble,
because when I was walking
on the red carpet,
the black press came after me.
"Excuse me, brother."
When you hear somebody
call you "brother" too much,
something terrible is about to happen.
"Excuse me, brother. Brother?"
And I looked back, and the motherfucker
had a tuxedo with the kente cloth tie.
I said, "Uh-oh."
He said, "I just want
to ask you a couple questions."
I said, "What publication are you with?"
He said, "Me? I'm with The Daily Bongo."
I said, "Daily Bongo? What the fuck?
Who the fuck reads this?"
He said, "Listen, brother,
I just want to ask you a quick question.
You understand that this year,
this is a boycott for the Oscars.
So, I'm just wondering what made you,
of all people,
cross the motherfucking picket line
and be here tonight."
I said, "Boycott?
Nigga, I haven't been working
in ten years.
What do you mean, boycott?
I've been on strike.
Y'all niggas didn't stop working.
I had to watch fucking Key and Peele
do my show every night!
So, fuck The Daily Bongo,"
is what I said.
I went to the Oscars
and had a wonderful time.
I went in that fucking green room.
It was filled with so many stars,
I couldn't even believe what I was seeing.
Hollywood was seducing me
all over again.
I was sitting back there.
I'm smoking, drinking with the stars.
And then two Hollywood movie producers
came over, right to me.
"Oh, my God. Dave Chappelle,"
said the leader one.
He was obviously gay.
Some guys, you can just tell.
The other one seemed like a money guy.
Maybe he was from Texas or some shit.
But the gay one was definitely the leader
because he did all the talking.
And then he hit me with:
"So, David, um...
do you have any movie ideas
that you would like to pursue?"
The truth is, I don't.
But if you know the game,
you're not supposed to tell motherfuckers
you don't have ideas.
I was like, "Yeah, man.
I got plenty of ideas."
And he called my bluff.
"Really? Like what?"
"Huh? Oh.
Um...
um..."
And then I just started making up shit
that I thought maybe he'd like to see.
I said, "I have a superhero idea."
He goes, "Really?"
I go, "Yeah. He's a...
He's a gay superhero."
He was like, "Really?!
What's it called?"
"Huh? Oh, it's called...
It's called Same Hero, New Boots.
It's about a gay sous-chef
in San Francisco...
that gets bit by a radioactive rat
on his shift
when he's taking out the trash
and is blessed with powers
beyond his wildest dreams,
supersonic gay kind of powers.
And he starts saving everybody
in San Francisco.
But at first, he only saves gay people.
Later, he saves everybody,
and the whole city just falls in love
with him.
The only problem is,
no one remembers him when he saves them."
"Well, I don't understand.
Why wouldn't they remember him?"
I said, "Because, dummy, he's gay.
He keeps changing his outfit.
People come up...
'Thanks for saving me, sir.
What's your name anyway?'
He's like, 'Same Hero, New Boots!'
And that motherfucker flies away."
He was like, "I like it a lot."
The Texan didn't like that shit at all.
He was upset.
"That's impossible, a gay superhero."
I said, "What? Well, I have others.
I have a superhero you'd love,
'cause he's stronger than Superman
and he fights for truth, justice
and the American way, like Superman,
but more than Superman.
He beats up Mexicans for no reason."
The Texan's like, "You got my attention."
I'm like, "Man,
this motherfucker's so strong,
he can fly and do all this great shit.
Only problem with this guy
is he can't even activate his powers
unless he touches...
unless he touches a woman's vagina.
Not a long touch, just a couple of pats."
He said, "Well,
what's the problem with that?"
I said, "The problem, sir,
is that our hero is not a handsome man.
And he's often short on cash.
So, whenever trouble breaks out,
he has to run around the city
and convince women
to let him pat their vaginas.
'Please, miss! That building's on fire.
Can I pat your vagina? Quickly.
People are dying!'
But he can't tell them exactly why.
'Eww! Get away! You're gross!'
'Please, miss! People are dying!
Just a couple of pats!'
'Eww! Gross! Get away!'
So, he rapes them.
I know, I know.
That's the dilemma for the audience.
Because he rapes,
but he saves a lot of lives.
And he saves way more than he rapes,
and he only rapes to save.
But he does rape."
I didn't realize it, but the whole
green room was looking at us.
All the celebrities were disgusted.
"Ohh."
That guy from Texas was like,
"Here's my card. Call me on Monday."
That worked out.
The second time I met OJ Simpson.
It was right after
the trial of the century.
There I was,
now a young man of probably 23.
OJ Simpson was the most famous,
or infamous, face on planet Earth.
I was in a restaurant in Beverly Hills
with my agents.
I wasn't alone in the restaurant,
but I was alone.
I was the only black person
in the restaurant.
And in the '90s,
that felt very uncomfortable.
Now I tend to enjoy it at this age.
I was having dinner with my agents,
celebrating a deal
that they told me was lucrative,
but I later learned fucking sucked.
And suddenly, a group of women walked by.
Every race was in that group.
Black, white, Asian, Latina,
white, white...
and white again.
They were all gorgeous.
I watched them walk by.
Then I saw a familiar face.
Al Cowlings,
the man from the infamous Bronco chase,
walked by and embraced one of the women,
and they walked towards the door.
Couldn't believe what I saw.
And then, close behind him,
was OJ Simpson,
newly released from jail.
The restaurant fell still.
I was shocked. I didn't mean
to say it out loud, but it just came out.
"OJ!"
He stopped,
turned around to see who said it,
saw my black face
and correctly assumed it was me.
I was sitting in the corner of the booth.
He leaned over all the white people
I was having dinner with
and shook my hand.
"How are you, young man?"
He looked in my eyes,
and I could see in his eyes
that he didn't remember meeting me
the first time.
And then he walked away.
And I looked back at my agents,
and all of them had nothing short
of disgust on their faces.
And the only one with the courage
to voice their disgust
was a woman named Sharon
who used to represent me.
"How could you?" she said.
"How could you shake hands
with that murderer?"
I said, "Sharon, with all due respect,
that murderer ran for over 11,000 yards.
And he was acquitted.
So, you know, fuck it.
The glove didn't fit.
The glove didn't fit.
Get over yourself."
Some people can't do that.
Some people just can't
get over themselves.
Gay people have a hard time
doing that recently.
Here we go. Here comes the deep water.
No, recently I've noticed that.
I noticed it
with that Manny Pacquiao controversy.
Yeah, it was...
Now, in the gay community's defense,
Manny Pacquiao said some outlandish shit
about gay people,
very not nice things that I won't repeat,
but there was biblical verses
and some analogies to animals.
It wasn't a good look.
Nike took his shoes immediately.
Which I thought was a little harsh.
A little harsh, you know what I mean?
Just 'cause he's Asian.
You know what I mean?
How the fuck are you gonna take the shoes
off an Asian dude to appease a gay dude?
You know what I mean?
No? You don't know what I mean.
But Asian people kind of know what I mean.
No? No Asians in the front? No?
No, this is what I mean.
Look, you're an Asian dude...
I say this with no disrespect.
We're all Americans, right?
And we can agree that America
has a huge body count all over the world,
but nowhere more than Asia.
Literally, if you look at history,
recently,
we have bombed the masculinity out
of an entire continent.
We dropped two atomic bombs
on fucking Japan,
and they've been drawing Hello Kitty
and shit ever since.
There's a lot of lady-boys
in the wake of our bombs.
And I know these things
because my wife is Asian.
She's Filipino.
All right, okay. So, that explains it.
Now you know why you see me
at all those Filipino events.
I'm not there picking up pussy.
I'm dropping some off.
I take my wife to all that shit.
I took my wife to see Pacquiao
fight Mayweather.
We sat ringside, okay? That...
Yeah, that was a quiet car ride home,
that's what that was.
But if you know what's popping
in the Philippines,
you know that they got a whole generation
of kids in the Philippines
growing up without their mothers. Yes.
A lot of women in the Philippines go
to the Arabian Peninsula,
they come to the United States,
they make all their money here,
they send all that money back home,
which is still one of the number-one
staples in the Philippines' economy...
money that the expats send back
to the Philippines.
The men, on the other hand,
are left rearing children,
twiddling their thumbs,
waiting on their wives' checks.
These men have been fucking emasculated.
And then suddenly,
a boxer rises from amongst them
and reinstates their manhood
with his motherfucking fist.
This is not the guy you're supposed
to ask,
"What do you think of homosexuals?"
He's not your champ.
Shit.
That's why I don't have a sneaker deal,
'cause if you say something
that people don't like,
they'll take your fucking shoes off.
If Martin Luther King had a sneaker deal,
we'd still be on the back of the bus.
It's true. The Nike exec would come up...
"Hi, Martin. Uh...
we need you to tone down the talk
of civil rights
and blacks being humans.
It's upsetting our Southern distributors."
"But I don't understand.
I thought that's why I had a sneaker deal
in the first place."
"Not quite.
Really, it's a walking shoe.
And we like the marching, but...
Try to understand."
Fuck that shit.
You know, I get it, though.
I understand why gay people are mad,
and I empathize.
You know what?
I'm just telling you this as a black dude.
I support your movement.
But if you want to take some advice
from a Negro, pace yourself.
These things take a while.
Just 'cause they passed the law
doesn't mean they're gonna like it.
Brown v. Board of Education was
in 1955.
Somebody called me a nigger in traffic
last Wednesday.
It takes a minute.
My wife's friend Stewart told me that.
My wife has a lot of gay friends.
Stewart's their leader.
She has a lot of gay friends.
And I don't like 'em.
Not 'cause they're gay.
I'm just judging them
on the merits of their character.
They're just not nice dudes.
They're fucking rude houseguests.
They're sitting on my couch,
giggling with my wife,
eating my motherfucking macaroons.
Then I come in,
and they act like the party's over.
"Hey, Stewart. What's going on?"
This guy talks to me the way
a cat would speak if a cat could talk.
"Hi, David."
"Stewart, what's all the beef, man?
What's going..."
He always wants to have
some kind of gay political argument.
The last one was about a petition
in federal court
to take the words "husband and wife" out
of the law.
I said, "Why would you want those words
out of the law?"
He said, "Because it discriminates
against same-sex couples."
I was like, "Niggas, please,
save me the semantics.
Just trust me. Take your chips
and get the fuck out of the casino.
You're about to crap out!
Just go outside,
talk that over amongst yourselves,
and whichever one of you is gayer,
that's the wife."
No, no. Stewart didn't like that.
Stewart educates me about this movement.
I didn't even know shit about it.
He told me it's called "LBGTQ!"
I was like, "What the fuck is the 'Q'?"
Does that even make sense? "Q"?
Turns out "Q" is like the vowels.
That shit is sometimes "Y."
It's for gay dudes
that don't really know they're gay.
Like prison fags who are like,
"What? I'm not gay, nigga.
I'm just sucking these dicks
to pass the time.
I'm not 'G.' I'm 'Q.' Ugh."
I think...
Okay, again, of all those letters,
the "T" has the toughest road ahead.
In fact, I think the "T" should stand
for "Tough road ahead."
They've got the longest mental gap
to bridge.
That's all I'm saying.
Because whenever I see one
of them Ts on the street,
I don't mind them,
but I'll be like, "Man, I miss Bruce."
I'm sorry, guys.
I'm 42. I remember Bruce Jenner.
Before the Kardashians, before all that,
this motherfucker
was a white American superhero.
It was amazing. He was beating Africans
at track and field.
We'd never seen anything like it.
He was on my cereal box growing up.
You know how much of that cereal I ate?
Nigga, I didn't know he was gonna do that.
I knew before you guys knew.
I heard things on the street in Hollywood.
You'd just be out, see people.
"Hey, what's up, Kanye?
Why the long face?"
"Nigga, you'll see.
I got two mother-in-laws now."
And when I heard he was gonna do it,
I was scared.
I didn't think the public was ready.
I didn't think the media was ready.
And you know what? I was wrong.
Not only did the public embrace him,
but the media was nice.
I'd never seen anything like it.
"Welcome to the world, Caitlyn.
So long, Bruce.
Hello, Caitlyn."
I was shocked! Is this happening?
Wait a minute.
Is this a time in American history
where an American can make a decision
for themselves,
and even though other Americans
don't understand it, they'll support it
and let this person live a happy life?
Is this what's happening?
If it is, then good for America.
That's Dave Chappelle, the American.
Although, Dave Chappelle,
the black American,
he was a little jealous.
I was like, "How the fuck
are transgender people
beating black people
in the discrimination Olympics?"
If the police shot half as many
transgenders as they did niggas last year,
there'd be a fucking war in LA.
I know black dudes in Brooklyn...
hard street motherfuckers...
that wear high heels just to feel safe.
Transgenders are gangsters.
I used to do business
with a transgender in Hollywood.
Man, everybody would be scared of her
in the boardroom.
She'd walk in there, newly-minted woman,
high heels, purse.
Wouldn't say anything to us,
just walk around the conference table,
looking mean and shit.
Then she'd walk to the head
of the conference table, stare at us all,
reach in her purse, pull her old dick out
and throw it on the table.
"Let's talk business, gentlemen."
"Aaah!"
Shit is scary as fuck.
If your best friend pitched that to you,
you'd be horrified.
"Yo, nigga, let's go to the hospital
and cut our dicks off
and make pussies out of them shits."
"What?!
Can't we just get matching jackets
or tattoos or something?
You sure that's what you want to do?"
"There's only way to find out, nigga.
Wu-Tang! Pow! Pow!
Let's go to the club
and trick niggas into fucking us. Yeah."
The third time I met OJ Simpson...
The third time I met OJ Simpson,
I was doing great in life.
I'd just finished the second season
of Chappelle's Show.
Man, those were good days.
I was playing a comedy club in Miami,
The Improv.
I don't know if you've ever been,
but if you have,
you'd know the door for the green room
is right on the stage.
Can you imagine such a thing?
If I walked out of the door
of the green room,
bam, I was right here,
right from the dressing room.
And I did that. I walked out,
and the whole crowd was like, "Hooray!"
And I looked...
ma'am, as close as you are to me...
I saw him as soon as I came out:
The Juice.
And I saw recognition in his eyes,
and it filled me with pride
that he knew who I was.
I didn't acknowledge his presence
because it was a white audience,
and I didn't want to start a panic.
But I did my show. The show went great.
I said, "Good night, everyone."
They all said, "Yay!"
And I didn't say nothing to OJ,
but I just gave him the signal
to let him know I knew he was there.
And I walked into the green room,
and OJ was already in there!
I was like,
"How the fuck is this possible?"
I was scared.
And then my friends came in,
and we all started talking.
We sat down on the couch.
And I'm just telling you what I saw
with my own eyes.
You can believe me or not believe me.
But in my experience, OJ Simpson...
one of the nicest men I'd ever met.
He was nice to me.
He was nice to my friends.
The conversation was filled with warmth
and levity, humor and wisdom.
We talked for 90 minutes,
and then suddenly, the Juice said,
"You know what? I've got to be going.
But it's good to see you again,
and I'm glad things went so well."
I said, "Thanks, Juice."
And my friends said,
"Yeah, goodbye, Mr. Juice."
They were new to the game.
He said, "No. Thank you...
for your hospitality. Good night, guys."
And we said, "Good night."
And he just walked out of the room.
And as soon as the door closed,
we all looked at each other like,
"That nigga did that shit.
Did you feel that?
I could feel like...
murder in the room."
Well, you young heads missed that shit.
You're all too young.
You don't remember that.
- How old are you, young, man? You.
- Twenty-four.
Twenty-four? You don't know shit.
You don't know shit!
You gotta Google shit
that I lived through.
See, this is why
I lock motherfuckers' phones up.
Seriously. Because the young kids,
you guys need to take a break from that...
We all need to break just
from that technology,
just for a minute.
You know, I'm from a different time,
young man. A dark time to you.
I'm from a time that I didn't even used
to know who was on the phone
until I answered the shit.
Like, when tragedy used to strike.
I remember I was 12 years old,
and the teacher wheeled a television set
into the classroom.
You remember these days?
And she turned it on
to one of three channels.
And she said,
"Class, the space shuttle is taking off,
and we're all gonna watch it take off."
Man, that shit was going great
for like, three to five minutes.
That's right. You remember.
It fucking exploded!
Right on television.
Everybody on board, dead.
Immediately presumed dead.
It was so bad, the teacher looked
at all the kids and was like...
"You can go home."
It was a goddamn national tragedy.
This was Cold War America.
The Russians were laughing at us.
My point is, for a guy your age
wouldn't even know the pain,
because in your generation,
it's like the space shuttle blows up
every fucking day.
How can you care about anything
when you know every goddamn thing?
I'm getting over one cop shooting,
and then another one happens,
and then another one happens,
and another one happens.
I'm crying about Paris,
and then Brussels happens.
I can't keep track of all this shit.
So you just give the fuck up.
That's the hallmark of your generation,
and that's fucked up,
because your generation lives
in the most difficult time
in human history.
This is the age of spin.
The age where nobody knows
what the fuck they're even looking at.
Did you know that Planned Parenthood was
for abortions?
It's for people
that don't plan things out at all.
That's right. So, a guy your age
doesn't really know how he feels.
Are you pro-choice?
Are you anti-consequences?
What does it all really mean?
It's easier not to care for you.
But for us, we were trained to care.
We were raised that way.
I used to watch a fucking cartoon
when I was growing up
called Care Bears.
It was about a fucking group
of teddy-bear people.
They were like teddy bears,
but they were like people,
and they were all different colors,
and they all fucking
just walked around, caring.
They cared about each other
and everything else.
They all had different designs
on their stomachs,
and the designs told you something
about what they might be like inside.
Very, very loving group of beings.
And when shit got real bad,
as nice as those teddy bears were,
they didn't get mean faces.
They got determined. Hmm!
And the leader would say,
"Come on, guys.
It's time for the Care Bear Stare!"
Remember that shit?
And them little teddy bears
would lock arms...
and stare at the problem...
and I'm not even bullshitting...
actual love would shoot out
of their chests...
and would dispel anything
that was fucked up.
And when we grew up,
we wanted to be like those bears.
And then we got our hearts broken,
because we found out
that life wasn't gonna let us do that
and that it's impossible
to shoot love out of your chest.
However, I have shot love
onto somebody's chest before.
I do it all the time.
It's the next best thing.
You kids don't know.
Your generation is just determined
to be angry, mad.
Everybody's mad.
Back when we were growing up,
only black people were mad.
Now everybody's just trying
to get in on the act.
I try to think to myself,
"When did everyone get mad?"
And then I realize
this happened before we were born.
This is a long way to go, but...
it probably started
in the Second World War.
Think about it.
All these black men,
millions of black men,
leave the United States
for the first time,
go over to Europe
with America's Armed Forces
and fight the Nazis
and make more money fighting Nazis
than they ever dreamed they would make
in the United States.
And a lot of those men,
while they were in Europe...
just to be real, not to be crass...
a lot of them probably got their dicks
sucked by white women.
I'm sorry, ladies and gentlemen.
This was World War II Europe,
and these were desperate times,
and penises were being sucked
for shoelaces and chocolate
and very frivolous things.
And it's very hard to come back to America
and sit on the back of the bus
after you've been in the South of France,
getting your dick sucked for a Crunch bar
or some crazy shit like that.
That's a life-changing experience.
And while that was happening in Europe,
here in America, for the first time,
women entered the workforce en masse,
by the millions.
All the men were gone.
Someone had to run the factory.
The ladies did it. That's right.
This was the first generation
of American women
to have independent income
en masse,
and when the men came back,
the women weren't the same.
American women had grown.
They were uttering phrases that no woman
on Earth had ever spoken before,
things like, "No" and "Shut the fuck up"
and "I don't feel like it."
And then behind the scenes of that,
there was a little-known government agency
that started testing mind control drugs
on the American public.
They fucked up.
They tested it for 12 years.
They didn't realize these drugs
were not mind-controlling.
They were mind-expanding.
It was LSD and mescaline
and shit like that.
And for the first time,
there was a new school of thought
that was chemically induced
that made people question
the very society they lived in.
By 1960,
the President of the United States
was only 42 years old.
Can you imagine?
DMX is older than that.
And he was gonna usher in a new era
of peace.
He was gonna avoid the Cold War.
He was gonna end segregation.
And they blew his fucking brains out
in front of everyone in Dallas.
This country was never the same.
There were seven more major assassinations
in the '60s.
Anyone that stood up and said anything
was shot down in the streets
like a fucking dog.
Kennedy, Kennedy, King, X, Evers,
on and on.
You didn't even have to be famous.
You could be a college student
at Kent State,
or in Mississippi,
protesting the Vietnam War,
and they shot them, too.
The '70s were a wild era.
And while all this was going on...
Bill Cosby raped 54 people.
Holy shit. That's a lot of rapes, man.
This guy's putting up real numbers.
He's like the Steph Curry of rape.
Man, that's a lot of rapes. Fifty-four?
If he had raped 30 less people...
that's still two dozen rapes!
Don't forget, each one of these rapes
has eight hours of sleep in it.
Ladies and gentlemen,
that's over 400 hours of rape.
It only takes 65 hours
to get a pilot's license.
If rapes were aircrafts,
this nigga is Top Gun for sure.
Yeah, that's a tough one.
And I was onstage not too long ago.
I was in Syracuse, New York.
Yeah. Well, yeah, for Syracuse.
But the show didn't go so good...
all because I was talking about Bill Cosby
a little bit.
Not a little bit. I'll be honest.
I talked about him for like, 25 minutes.
And a woman stood up
in the back of the room,
and she screamed out,
"You are a fucking asshole
for saying these things!"
"I know."
Instantly, I felt bad.
Not bad about what I was saying.
I just felt bad like, "Oh, that's too bad
she doesn't like the show."
I didn't realize it at first,
but not only did she say that,
she was rushing the stage.
By the time I saw her,
I just saw this shadowy figure
fucking charging up the aisle towards me
in full fight mode.
I was horrified. I said, "Oh, my God!
I'm gonna kick this bitch in the face."
Lucky for me, I didn't have to.
Security tackled her.
But it was a really
fucking horrifying scene.
A scuffle ensued. And then,
finally, she screamed out to me,
"Women suffer!"
I said, "I know."
And, ladies,
I need you to know... that I know.
I need you to know. Seriously,
there's a lot of men in this room
that identify themselves as feminists.
I would include myself in that.
Don't ever forget, we all have mothers
and daughters and sisters and wives,
and we want to see
all these women do well
and not be held back by their gender.
There's a lot of men like that
in this room.
There's a lot of men like that
in the world.
Or as we are known on the streets,
bitch-ass niggas.
But as this woman was wrestling
and screaming at me,
I started to take offense.
And I'll be honest, race was involved.
She was a young white woman.
Well-intentioned, but just not thinking it
all the way through.
"Bitch, how the fuck are you going to yell
at a black man about discrimination?"
She didn't get it. She just kept going.
"Women suffer!"
"I know."
"Women suffer!" "Same team."
"Women suffer!" "I know."
And this is when she went too far:
"We suffer just like you."
"Slow your roll, bitch.
You suffer, yes, but not like me.
Not like us."
She goes, "Suffering is suffering.
What's the difference?"
I said, "Come on, white woman,
you know what it is.
You was in on the heist.
You just don't like your cut."
You suffer, I suffer.
You suffer, I suffer. That's how it works.
Can't do comparative suffering.
If you're hungry, and your friend says,
"You know, people are starving in Africa,"
"So what, nigga? I still want lunch."
Black people know
about comparative suffering,
and you know that
it's a fucking dead-end game.
Blacks and Jews do that shit to each other
all the time.
You ever played Who Suffered More
with a Jewish person?
It's a tough game.
Whenever you think you've got
the Jewish guy on the ropes,
that motherfucker will be like,
"Well, don't forget about Egypt."
"Egypt?! God damn, nigga, I didn't know
we was going all the way back to Egypt."
What the fuck is wrong with her?
What does she think?
Does she think that I don't know
that rape is wrong?
Does she think that maybe
I don't have empathy
for Bill Cosby's alleged victims?
And I would be remiss
if I didn't remind you
that technically these are all
still allegations.
Although, I admit it looks very bad.
Perhaps if she looked at it correctly,
she would have empathy for me,
the man she was attacking,
a 42-year-old black comedian.
Obviously, Bill Cosby was a hero to me.
And she doesn't know what it feels like
to think that your hero
might've done something so heinous,
my God, you can't imagine.
It'd be as if you heard
that chocolate ice cream itself...
had raped 54 people.
You'd say to yourself,
"Oh, man, but I like chocolate ice cream.
I don't want it to rape."
Didn't want to believe it.
At first, I didn't believe it.
I said, "These people are obviously trying
to destroy Dr. Cosby's rich legacy."
Even 34 allegations into it,
I was still like, "Man...
he probably only raped ten or 11
of those people."
I know, I know. But it's really tough.
You guys are young.
Imagine if you found out 40 years from now
that Kevin Hart raped 54 people.
You'd be like, "Oh, my God."
The only one that would believe that
would be Katt Williams.
He'd be like, "I knew that motherfucker
was up to something!
I knew Kevin had raped those people."
You know,
I was mad at Kevin, too, though.
You know why? Okay, first of all,
I didn't even know
Kevin was as successful as he was.
I found that shit out the hard way.
I was at home when my son busted in.
He said, "Dad, I need $250."
He's only 12 years old, so I freaked out.
"What's going on, nigga?
Is somebody trying to kill you?"
He said, "No, no.
Kevin Hart's coming to town,
and I wanted to see his show."
I said, "How much are the tickets?"
He said, "They're $125."
I said, "God damn! Mine are only 80."
I said, "Why do you need $250, then?"
He goes, "Because I want to go
with you, Dad. Please?
And there it is.
So, I took him to the show.
And we go, we sit right up front.
The lights go down, and one opening act
after another goes on.
Then Kevin takes the stage.
The crowd goes fucking nuts.
Thousands of people. I was furious.
The longer the show went on,
the madder I got.
Because his show was fucking outstanding.
It was maddening. These people
were fucking holding their stomachs.
My son was slapping his knee.
I'm like, "Damn, nigga, I do this, too."
Kevin says, "Good night."
The crowd goes crazy.
And then everyone starts walking
to his door, and the lights come on,
and then my son is just standing there,
looking at an empty stage.
People are pushing past me,
and nobody's recognizing me.
I'm like,
"Man, this place fucking sucks!"
I said, "Come on, son,
let's get out of here."
Then my son looks back at me and says,
"Dad, please.
Please, I have to meet him."
I was like, "Oh, my God."
So, I took him backstage.
I've known Kevin for years,
but can you believe I was scared
to knock on his dressing room door?
I almost said...
"Son, I haven't seen him for a long time."
And one of Kevin's goons opened the door.
"Hey, what's up, Dave Chappelle?
What are you doing, man?
It's good to see you, brother.
What are you doing in this area?
This is a terrible area."
I'm like, "Actually, I live around here.
Listen...
is Kevin here?
My son just wanted
to meet him real quick."
"I don't know,
'cause Kevin's about to eat dinner."
Just then, Kevin came around the corner
to see who it was.
"What? Oh, shit! What's up, Dave?
Come on back.
I was just about to have dinner.
I don't know if you guys ate,
but you're welcome to join me
if you'd like."
And then my son pushed passed me.
It was some cold shit.
He goes, "Actually, Mr. Hart,
we haven't eaten in several hours."
Man, Kevin took us into his back room.
This guy had a fucking spread.
It was Tuesday night. This motherfucker
was having Sunday dinner.
There were steaks, chops,
corn with butter all over it.
My son was eating all fast,
embarrassing me.
I was like, "Slow down, son."
He was like...
Then I looked over in the corner,
and there was a box
of custom-made jerseys
for the local team.
Each one was hand-stitched,
and on the back,
they stitched on "K-Hart" on all of them.
Kevin saw me staring at that box,
and he went over
and grabbed one of them jerseys,
and he walked right to my son.
He said, "Hey, little man.
I want you to have this."
And my son was like, "Thanks, Mr. Hart."
This is when I got mad.
He goes,
"If your father ever makes you mad,
put that on."
And he walked out.
Oh, that was some cold shit.
Then I realized...
I looked up what Kevin made on Google.
I couldn't believe that shit.
Kevin is the first comedian
that a Drake song could be about.
Kevin could walk around his house
and sing "All Me,"
and the whole song would still be true.
"Got everything, I got everything
I cannot complain, I cannot
I don't even know
How much I really made
I forgot, it's a lot
Fuck that, never mind what I got"
And his wife will be like,
"Kevin, come to bed!"
He'll be like...
"Ho, shut the fuck up
I got way too much... "
You know how much money you have to have
to tell a girl to shut the fuck up?
I have "Quiet, please" money at best.
I'd have to take a loan out
for "Shut the fuck up."
"Shut the fuck up..."
That's Jay Z money.
And Beyonc got
"No, you shut the fuck up" money.
Let's not forget. Let's not forget.
I've never met Bill Cosby,
so I'm not defending him.
Let's just remember
that he has a valuable legacy
that I can't just throw away.
I remember that he's the first black man
to ever win an Emmy in television.
I also remember that he's the first guy
to make a cartoon with black characters
where their lips and noses
were drawn proportionately.
I remember that he had a television show
that got numbers equivalent
to the Super Bowl every Thursday night.
And I remember that he partnered up
with a clinical psychologist to make sure
that there was not one negative image
of African-Americans on his show.
I'm telling you, that's no small thing.
I've had a television show.
I wouldn't have done that shit.
He gave tens of millions of dollars
to African-American institutions
of higher learning,
and is directly responsible for thousands
of black kids going to college.
Not just the ones he raped.
Here comes the kicker. You ready?
Here's the fact that I heard,
but haven't confirmed.
I heard that when Martin Luther King stood
on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial
and said he had a dream,
he was speaking into a PA system
that Bill Cosby paid for.
So, you understand what I'm saying?
The point is this:
He rapes, but he saves.
And he saves more than he rapes.
But he probably does rape.
Thank you very much! Good night!
Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait!
I forgot.
The fourth time I met OJ Simpson.
The fourth time is not the funniest time,
but it was the last time
I'd see the Juice.
For some reason,
I was at the Kentucky Derby.
It's a very long story.
This is right after I quit
Chappelle's Show
in spectacular fashion.
There was a party hosted
by Michael Jordan,
and every athlete I've ever admired was
in that room.
Yes.
And then I saw a familiar face by the bar,
standing there, drinking alone.
It was Chris Tucker. Now...
you have to remember, at this time,
we were both technically missing.
And we went over,
and we're talking with one another,
and motherfuckers were amazed
to see us together.
Seeing me and Chris Tucker at that point
would be like seeing Bigfoot
riding a unicorn.
You wouldn't believe
that's what you were seeing.
And then, through all the gawkers,
a familiar face pushed through the crowd.
Here he was again.
The Juice.
He had his camera ready.
He was like, "Dave, Chris.
Good to see you guys.
Hey, come on, guys.
Let's all get together for a picture."
And at the same time,
me and Chris were like, "No.
I can't do that.
Sorry, Juice, my career is too flimsy
to survive a picture with you."
That's the end. Good night.
One last thing. Before you go,
I just wanted to acknowledge
for the real comedy fans.
We can't not acknowledge it.
We lost a fucking juggernaut
in comedy this week.
So, I'm just shouting out the family
and friends of Garry Shandling.
Much love to you guys.
My sincerest condolences.
And for the hip-hop fans
in the building...
put two fingers up in the air
for A Tribe Called Quest
and my man Phife Dawg.
May he rest in peace forever and ever.
Thank you for that beautiful music.
Good night, everybody. Thank you.
Twos up! Twos up!
Hands up, hands up! Twos up!
We're gonna do this for Phife!
I need everybody to rap with me right now!
I'm rich, biatch!
This is Dave.
He tells dirty jokes for a living.
That stare is where most
of his hard work happens.
It signifies a profound train of thought,
the alchemist's fire
that transforms fear and tragedy
into levity and livelihood.
Dave calls that look "the trance."
Thank you! Thank you very much!
Thank you all.
Oh, wow.
That was exciting, wasn't it?
Thank you, guys.
Have a seat, feel comfortable, relax.
I want to thank everyone in LA
for a wonderful week.
It's been great here.
You know what? It's been ten years
since the last time I played Los Angeles,
if you can imagine.
I know! I know, I've been gone
for a very long time.
And unbeknownst to you,
it was a difficult ten years.
I'm not gonna take you
through all the agony I've been through,
but it was tough.
Some of it you might've seen.
I don't know if you ever saw on TMZ
the big headline:
"Dave Chappelle Drunk Onstage in Detroit."
Well, if you saw it, I wasn't drunk.
I had smoked some reefer...
with some rappers.
Yeah. I don't know if you know anything
about hanging out with rappers,
but their weed is very strong,
stronger than I what I was accustomed to.
The article goes on
to say I was booed offstage,
which is also incorrect.
I was booed.
I did not leave.
It was a long bomb.
It was a fucking nightmare.
Two puffs of weed, that's all it was.
Two puffs.
I never had that happen,
where I take two puffs of weed,
I looked at the guy next to me,
I was like, "I'm gonna bomb, nigga.
I can feel it."
And that guy called my name.
"Dave Chappelle!"
Niggas was like...
Normally, when you do a comedy show...
you guys don't know what it looks like
up here,
but niggas be just looking up
at you like...
That's how the show started.
Didn't take long for their faces
to switch up like, "What the fuck?"
They started looking amongst themselves.
So I knew I wasn't doing good.
I don't remember what I was saying.
It just took one person to break the ice.
It was a black lady
with a Ford Motor shirt on.
Stood up suddenly.
"Fuck you, Dave Chappelle!"
I said, "Excuse me?"
She said, "I worked all week
for this shit, and this show sucks!"
And in a weird act of racial harmony,
a conservative white guy stood up
and backed her up.
"Yeah!"
The whole crowd banded together
and started chanting,
"We want our money back!
We want our money back!"
I said, "Oh, shit." I snapped out of it.
"Good people of Detroit, hear me.
Hear me now.
You will never get
your fucking money back."
Fuck that.
I said, "I'm like Evel Knievel.
I get paid for the attempt.
I didn't promise this shit would be good."
"Boo!" They said, "Fuck you!"
This went on for a long time.
And then, after the show, I felt so bad,
I took half of the money from the show...
thousands of dollars...
I said, "I'm gonna give this to charity."
You know what I did?
I bought $25,000 worth of bubble gum
and drove around Detroit
and handed it out to the homeless
so they could chew it
and still be hungry.
I was very mad at Detroit that night.
Because not only did I bomb,
I had to go back to the very same room
the next night and do it all over again.
Fucking nightmare. That would be like
if you were having sex with a woman
and, for some reason...
this would never happen...
but for some reason,
she had a mousetrap in her pussy.
You get caught in the trap.
And then you've got to fuck her again
tomorrow night.
I'd still do it,
but I'd be careful the next time.
The old mousetrap-in-the-pussy trick, eh?
Fool me once.
Yeah. Yeah, it was a tough time.
And I wanted to give up sometimes.
I almost did give up,
but then, right before I gave up,
I decided not to.
But I made the call.
They answered the phone.
"Hello? Dancing with the Stars."
I said, "Not yet.
Not yet."
Yeah.
If you see me on that shit, it's over.
Trust me. My spirit is broken.
If you see me waiting for them judges...
getting critiqued on my cha-cha,
fuck that.
I've been hanging out in...
I haven't been working in LA,
but I come out here and hang out and shit.
I was out here a few weeks ago.
I almost got arrested.
I'm not bullshitting.
This happens to a lot of black people.
What happened was...
I was coming out of one
of those nightclubs in Hollywood,
and my friend saw me.
I guess I was wobbling or something.
So, he just rolled up.
He's a good friend of mine.
He's like, "Hey, Dave, give me the keys."
I was like, "All right, nigga,
just take the keys."
And I got in the passenger's side
of my car, and he drove it.
It was fine. Just talking, chopping it up.
And then, on the 10,
the blue-and-whites hit us.
Now, I should tell you,
the friend that was driving me was black,
which really doesn't have anything to do
with the story
other than to let you know
there was fear in the car.
Not my fear. I'm black,
but I'm also Dave Chappelle.
So, I figured, you know,
shit will probably be fine.
Traffic stop started off
on the right foot.
The cops came up to the driver's side.
"Hi. How are you guys doing tonight?"
And he recognized me immediately.
"Oh. Dave Chappelle."
And I looked at my friend like,
"We're getting out of this shit."
And then he says,
"You guys were swerving in the lane.
Do you mind just stepping out of the car
for a second?"
Still no cause for alarm.
I looked through the rearview mirror.
The body language of the arrest
looked good.
Just talking.
So, then I started fucking with the radio.
You know a traffic stop is going good
if you're listening to the radio
when someone else is outside of the car.
But then, when I looked back
in the rearview mirror,
something had gone horribly wrong.
That motherfucker was back there like...
And the next thing I knew, they were
stuffing him in the back of the car,
and I thought what anybody would think
in a situation like that:
"Oh, my God.
What is gonna happen to me?"
And the police walked up to the window.
"Mr. Chappelle,
we had to arrest your friend.
He refused to take our breathalyzer test."
I said, "That motherfucker.
Not complying? That's odd.
So, officer, what's gonna happen to me?"
"You're fine. We're just gonna have to
ask you to step out of the car
so we can impound the vehicle,
and we'll arrange for you
to have a ride home."
I said, "Oh, well, no.
I would rather you just give me the keys."
He said, "Mr. Chappelle,
your friend already told us
he's your designated driver.
We can't let you drive in this condition."
I was like, "No, nigga, I'm good."
And then suddenly,
the shit turned into Vegas.
He was like...
"I'll let you blow for it."
I said, "Excuse me?"
He said,
"If you blow in my breathalyzer..."
I said, "Oh, nigga, I thought
you was trying to get your dick sucked.
What's the...
Whew!
Whew!"
"If you blow in my breathalyzer and pass,
I'll give you the keys to the car."
I said, "Uh...
set 'em up, nigga. Let's play."
And I blew in that thing.
And it made a noise. "Beep!"
I said, "Uh-oh."
And he looked at it. He said,
"Oh, well, Mr. Chappelle,
I guess you're free to go."
I said, "I am?"
I didn't know that thing
didn't pick up weed.
I drove home on the 10
30 miles an hour.
Yeah, it all worked out.
It all worked out.
I'm one of the lucky ones. It doesn't
work out that well for everybody.
I saw that videotape of that lady
that got beat up in LA in traffic.
You see that shit on rush hour traffic?
They beat a black woman's ass.
This woman didn't even do anything wrong.
It's fucked up. It was so fucked up,
it didn't even go to court.
The City of L.A. just gave that woman
$1.5 million for her pain and suffering.
That is not bad,
considering that's the same amount
of money that Marcos Maidana made
to fight Floyd Mayweather
the second time.
And this woman obviously hasn't trained
a day in her life.
You can see it on the tape.
She didn't come to fight.
Her guards were low.
She was taking a lot of shots.
Everybody's mad at police now.
I watched that...
You see that shit on Netflix,
Making a Murderer?
The Steven Avery story.
If you haven't seen it, check it out.
Steven Avery is in more trouble
than any white person
in the history of the United States
has ever been in!
In a justice system designed
for him to thrive,
he's failed miserably twice.
I can't even wrap my mind around it.
If Making a Murderer
was about a black dude,
that shit would be called Duh!
Of course everything would go wrong.
Seems like he did it, all right.
The motherfucker even had $200,000
for his legal defense.
That should get you off in Wisconsin.
That's like OJ money.
All he needed to get off
that he didn't have
was a single black juror.
That's all it would've took.
Because only a black dude
in the United States
can look at 11 other dudes and be like,
"I think the police did this shit."
He's fucked up in the game.
That's how OJ got off.
I've been watching that new OJ show.
I can't get enough of that shit.
Doesn't it bring back good memories?
But I forgot just how polarizing
that OJ case was.
And you know, I've met OJ Simpson
on four different occasions in my life.
And before the end of the show,
I will tell you about each
of those occasions.
The first time I met OJ Simpson,
I was in Santa Monica.
- Santa Monica!
- Yeah!
I can't believe a black dude was like,
"Santa Monica!"
You the last nigga I would expect
to say that.
Let me see your shoes.
You got some Vans on, nigga? What you got?
"Santa Monica!"
You?
At the time, I was 18.
I had done a show,
and the guy from the club came up
and was like, "Hey, OJ Simpson's here,
and he said he wants to meet you."
I said, "What? Fuck yeah!"
I ran down the steps,
and OJ was down there.
He's like, "Hey, young man. How are you?
It's very good to meet you.
And you're doing really good work,
and I hope good things happen for you
in your life."
I was like, "Man, thanks, Mr. Juice."
Standing beside him, was...
I don't know the nice way to say this...
his soon-to-be-slain wife.
Ohh!
Ladies and gentlemen, man the fuck up,
or you're not gonna make it
to the end of this show.
Just man the fuck up.
She's dead.
We already know what happened.
We don't know who did it,
but we know what happened.
I should tell you,
that woman was very nice to me.
She actually embraced me.
She said, "I think you're adorable,"
and she hugged me.
She goes, "Good luck to you,"
and she held me for a long time.
And I whispered in her ear, "Bitch,
are you trying to get us both killed?"
I'm just kidding.
I didn't say that, but...
that was the first time,
in a nutshell.
It's good to see so many...
so many different people here
from so many different ethnicities.
Very diverse crowd.
Looks like you thought Bernie Sanders
was gonna come out in this motherfucker.
But... surprise!
It's me.
Yeah.
Yeah, you know, I'm happy, really,
to see black people come.
A lot of black people don't fuck
with me like they used to.
But there's a few reasons
you don't see black people at my shows.
One is because, obviously, black people
have slower Internet connections.
I mean, that would be my guess.
I don't know what...
Actually, my own actions drew a wedge
between me and the community
I hold so dear.
A couple of weeks ago,
I was supposed to be in Flint, Michigan,
for a charity benefit that was supposed
to raise awareness
for the appalling condition
of the water in Flint.
I don't know if you know this,
but the water in Flint
is fucking poisonous.
It's actually making people sick.
Hollywood people are like,
"So what? At least they have water."
But this water...
this water is fucked up.
So, a lot of black celebrities flew
into Flint,
and they did a tremendous charity benefit,
and I was on the schedule to appear.
Uh...
So, the reason a lot of people
haven't heard about this benefit...
it was the same day as the Oscars.
Right, I know. So, I was on my way
to the airport to go to Flint,
and then Chris Rock calls me
and is like,
"Hey, Dave, I got a ticket for you
for the Oscars. Can you make it?"
And I was like, "Sure, nigga.
I'm on my way to the airport right now."
Come on, man.
What am I gonna do about that water?
What am I, a fucking superhero?
I need to have fun. I need to live, too!
I didn't fuck that water up!
Stevie Wonder was there.
They didn't need me.
I'm sorry, everybody.
I'd never been to the Oscars.
You've seen the movies I make.
I was excited.
I knew I was gonna get into some trouble,
because when I was walking
on the red carpet,
the black press came after me.
"Excuse me, brother."
When you hear somebody
call you "brother" too much,
something terrible is about to happen.
"Excuse me, brother. Brother?"
And I looked back, and the motherfucker
had a tuxedo with the kente cloth tie.
I said, "Uh-oh."
He said, "I just want
to ask you a couple questions."
I said, "What publication are you with?"
He said, "Me? I'm with The Daily Bongo."
I said, "Daily Bongo? What the fuck?
Who the fuck reads this?"
He said, "Listen, brother,
I just want to ask you a quick question.
You understand that this year,
this is a boycott for the Oscars.
So, I'm just wondering what made you,
of all people,
cross the motherfucking picket line
and be here tonight."
I said, "Boycott?
Nigga, I haven't been working
in ten years.
What do you mean, boycott?
I've been on strike.
Y'all niggas didn't stop working.
I had to watch fucking Key and Peele
do my show every night!
So, fuck The Daily Bongo,"
is what I said.
I went to the Oscars
and had a wonderful time.
I went in that fucking green room.
It was filled with so many stars,
I couldn't even believe what I was seeing.
Hollywood was seducing me
all over again.
I was sitting back there.
I'm smoking, drinking with the stars.
And then two Hollywood movie producers
came over, right to me.
"Oh, my God. Dave Chappelle,"
said the leader one.
He was obviously gay.
Some guys, you can just tell.
The other one seemed like a money guy.
Maybe he was from Texas or some shit.
But the gay one was definitely the leader
because he did all the talking.
And then he hit me with:
"So, David, um...
do you have any movie ideas
that you would like to pursue?"
The truth is, I don't.
But if you know the game,
you're not supposed to tell motherfuckers
you don't have ideas.
I was like, "Yeah, man.
I got plenty of ideas."
And he called my bluff.
"Really? Like what?"
"Huh? Oh.
Um...
um..."
And then I just started making up shit
that I thought maybe he'd like to see.
I said, "I have a superhero idea."
He goes, "Really?"
I go, "Yeah. He's a...
He's a gay superhero."
He was like, "Really?!
What's it called?"
"Huh? Oh, it's called...
It's called Same Hero, New Boots.
It's about a gay sous-chef
in San Francisco...
that gets bit by a radioactive rat
on his shift
when he's taking out the trash
and is blessed with powers
beyond his wildest dreams,
supersonic gay kind of powers.
And he starts saving everybody
in San Francisco.
But at first, he only saves gay people.
Later, he saves everybody,
and the whole city just falls in love
with him.
The only problem is,
no one remembers him when he saves them."
"Well, I don't understand.
Why wouldn't they remember him?"
I said, "Because, dummy, he's gay.
He keeps changing his outfit.
People come up...
'Thanks for saving me, sir.
What's your name anyway?'
He's like, 'Same Hero, New Boots!'
And that motherfucker flies away."
He was like, "I like it a lot."
The Texan didn't like that shit at all.
He was upset.
"That's impossible, a gay superhero."
I said, "What? Well, I have others.
I have a superhero you'd love,
'cause he's stronger than Superman
and he fights for truth, justice
and the American way, like Superman,
but more than Superman.
He beats up Mexicans for no reason."
The Texan's like, "You got my attention."
I'm like, "Man,
this motherfucker's so strong,
he can fly and do all this great shit.
Only problem with this guy
is he can't even activate his powers
unless he touches...
unless he touches a woman's vagina.
Not a long touch, just a couple of pats."
He said, "Well,
what's the problem with that?"
I said, "The problem, sir,
is that our hero is not a handsome man.
And he's often short on cash.
So, whenever trouble breaks out,
he has to run around the city
and convince women
to let him pat their vaginas.
'Please, miss! That building's on fire.
Can I pat your vagina? Quickly.
People are dying!'
But he can't tell them exactly why.
'Eww! Get away! You're gross!'
'Please, miss! People are dying!
Just a couple of pats!'
'Eww! Gross! Get away!'
So, he rapes them.
I know, I know.
That's the dilemma for the audience.
Because he rapes,
but he saves a lot of lives.
And he saves way more than he rapes,
and he only rapes to save.
But he does rape."
I didn't realize it, but the whole
green room was looking at us.
All the celebrities were disgusted.
"Ohh."
That guy from Texas was like,
"Here's my card. Call me on Monday."
That worked out.
The second time I met OJ Simpson.
It was right after
the trial of the century.
There I was,
now a young man of probably 23.
OJ Simpson was the most famous,
or infamous, face on planet Earth.
I was in a restaurant in Beverly Hills
with my agents.
I wasn't alone in the restaurant,
but I was alone.
I was the only black person
in the restaurant.
And in the '90s,
that felt very uncomfortable.
Now I tend to enjoy it at this age.
I was having dinner with my agents,
celebrating a deal
that they told me was lucrative,
but I later learned fucking sucked.
And suddenly, a group of women walked by.
Every race was in that group.
Black, white, Asian, Latina,
white, white...
and white again.
They were all gorgeous.
I watched them walk by.
Then I saw a familiar face.
Al Cowlings,
the man from the infamous Bronco chase,
walked by and embraced one of the women,
and they walked towards the door.
Couldn't believe what I saw.
And then, close behind him,
was OJ Simpson,
newly released from jail.
The restaurant fell still.
I was shocked. I didn't mean
to say it out loud, but it just came out.
"OJ!"
He stopped,
turned around to see who said it,
saw my black face
and correctly assumed it was me.
I was sitting in the corner of the booth.
He leaned over all the white people
I was having dinner with
and shook my hand.
"How are you, young man?"
He looked in my eyes,
and I could see in his eyes
that he didn't remember meeting me
the first time.
And then he walked away.
And I looked back at my agents,
and all of them had nothing short
of disgust on their faces.
And the only one with the courage
to voice their disgust
was a woman named Sharon
who used to represent me.
"How could you?" she said.
"How could you shake hands
with that murderer?"
I said, "Sharon, with all due respect,
that murderer ran for over 11,000 yards.
And he was acquitted.
So, you know, fuck it.
The glove didn't fit.
The glove didn't fit.
Get over yourself."
Some people can't do that.
Some people just can't
get over themselves.
Gay people have a hard time
doing that recently.
Here we go. Here comes the deep water.
No, recently I've noticed that.
I noticed it
with that Manny Pacquiao controversy.
Yeah, it was...
Now, in the gay community's defense,
Manny Pacquiao said some outlandish shit
about gay people,
very not nice things that I won't repeat,
but there was biblical verses
and some analogies to animals.
It wasn't a good look.
Nike took his shoes immediately.
Which I thought was a little harsh.
A little harsh, you know what I mean?
Just 'cause he's Asian.
You know what I mean?
How the fuck are you gonna take the shoes
off an Asian dude to appease a gay dude?
You know what I mean?
No? You don't know what I mean.
But Asian people kind of know what I mean.
No? No Asians in the front? No?
No, this is what I mean.
Look, you're an Asian dude...
I say this with no disrespect.
We're all Americans, right?
And we can agree that America
has a huge body count all over the world,
but nowhere more than Asia.
Literally, if you look at history,
recently,
we have bombed the masculinity out
of an entire continent.
We dropped two atomic bombs
on fucking Japan,
and they've been drawing Hello Kitty
and shit ever since.
There's a lot of lady-boys
in the wake of our bombs.
And I know these things
because my wife is Asian.
She's Filipino.
All right, okay. So, that explains it.
Now you know why you see me
at all those Filipino events.
I'm not there picking up pussy.
I'm dropping some off.
I take my wife to all that shit.
I took my wife to see Pacquiao
fight Mayweather.
We sat ringside, okay? That...
Yeah, that was a quiet car ride home,
that's what that was.
But if you know what's popping
in the Philippines,
you know that they got a whole generation
of kids in the Philippines
growing up without their mothers. Yes.
A lot of women in the Philippines go
to the Arabian Peninsula,
they come to the United States,
they make all their money here,
they send all that money back home,
which is still one of the number-one
staples in the Philippines' economy...
money that the expats send back
to the Philippines.
The men, on the other hand,
are left rearing children,
twiddling their thumbs,
waiting on their wives' checks.
These men have been fucking emasculated.
And then suddenly,
a boxer rises from amongst them
and reinstates their manhood
with his motherfucking fist.
This is not the guy you're supposed
to ask,
"What do you think of homosexuals?"
He's not your champ.
Shit.
That's why I don't have a sneaker deal,
'cause if you say something
that people don't like,
they'll take your fucking shoes off.
If Martin Luther King had a sneaker deal,
we'd still be on the back of the bus.
It's true. The Nike exec would come up...
"Hi, Martin. Uh...
we need you to tone down the talk
of civil rights
and blacks being humans.
It's upsetting our Southern distributors."
"But I don't understand.
I thought that's why I had a sneaker deal
in the first place."
"Not quite.
Really, it's a walking shoe.
And we like the marching, but...
Try to understand."
Fuck that shit.
You know, I get it, though.
I understand why gay people are mad,
and I empathize.
You know what?
I'm just telling you this as a black dude.
I support your movement.
But if you want to take some advice
from a Negro, pace yourself.
These things take a while.
Just 'cause they passed the law
doesn't mean they're gonna like it.
Brown v. Board of Education was
in 1955.
Somebody called me a nigger in traffic
last Wednesday.
It takes a minute.
My wife's friend Stewart told me that.
My wife has a lot of gay friends.
Stewart's their leader.
She has a lot of gay friends.
And I don't like 'em.
Not 'cause they're gay.
I'm just judging them
on the merits of their character.
They're just not nice dudes.
They're fucking rude houseguests.
They're sitting on my couch,
giggling with my wife,
eating my motherfucking macaroons.
Then I come in,
and they act like the party's over.
"Hey, Stewart. What's going on?"
This guy talks to me the way
a cat would speak if a cat could talk.
"Hi, David."
"Stewart, what's all the beef, man?
What's going..."
He always wants to have
some kind of gay political argument.
The last one was about a petition
in federal court
to take the words "husband and wife" out
of the law.
I said, "Why would you want those words
out of the law?"
He said, "Because it discriminates
against same-sex couples."
I was like, "Niggas, please,
save me the semantics.
Just trust me. Take your chips
and get the fuck out of the casino.
You're about to crap out!
Just go outside,
talk that over amongst yourselves,
and whichever one of you is gayer,
that's the wife."
No, no. Stewart didn't like that.
Stewart educates me about this movement.
I didn't even know shit about it.
He told me it's called "LBGTQ!"
I was like, "What the fuck is the 'Q'?"
Does that even make sense? "Q"?
Turns out "Q" is like the vowels.
That shit is sometimes "Y."
It's for gay dudes
that don't really know they're gay.
Like prison fags who are like,
"What? I'm not gay, nigga.
I'm just sucking these dicks
to pass the time.
I'm not 'G.' I'm 'Q.' Ugh."
I think...
Okay, again, of all those letters,
the "T" has the toughest road ahead.
In fact, I think the "T" should stand
for "Tough road ahead."
They've got the longest mental gap
to bridge.
That's all I'm saying.
Because whenever I see one
of them Ts on the street,
I don't mind them,
but I'll be like, "Man, I miss Bruce."
I'm sorry, guys.
I'm 42. I remember Bruce Jenner.
Before the Kardashians, before all that,
this motherfucker
was a white American superhero.
It was amazing. He was beating Africans
at track and field.
We'd never seen anything like it.
He was on my cereal box growing up.
You know how much of that cereal I ate?
Nigga, I didn't know he was gonna do that.
I knew before you guys knew.
I heard things on the street in Hollywood.
You'd just be out, see people.
"Hey, what's up, Kanye?
Why the long face?"
"Nigga, you'll see.
I got two mother-in-laws now."
And when I heard he was gonna do it,
I was scared.
I didn't think the public was ready.
I didn't think the media was ready.
And you know what? I was wrong.
Not only did the public embrace him,
but the media was nice.
I'd never seen anything like it.
"Welcome to the world, Caitlyn.
So long, Bruce.
Hello, Caitlyn."
I was shocked! Is this happening?
Wait a minute.
Is this a time in American history
where an American can make a decision
for themselves,
and even though other Americans
don't understand it, they'll support it
and let this person live a happy life?
Is this what's happening?
If it is, then good for America.
That's Dave Chappelle, the American.
Although, Dave Chappelle,
the black American,
he was a little jealous.
I was like, "How the fuck
are transgender people
beating black people
in the discrimination Olympics?"
If the police shot half as many
transgenders as they did niggas last year,
there'd be a fucking war in LA.
I know black dudes in Brooklyn...
hard street motherfuckers...
that wear high heels just to feel safe.
Transgenders are gangsters.
I used to do business
with a transgender in Hollywood.
Man, everybody would be scared of her
in the boardroom.
She'd walk in there, newly-minted woman,
high heels, purse.
Wouldn't say anything to us,
just walk around the conference table,
looking mean and shit.
Then she'd walk to the head
of the conference table, stare at us all,
reach in her purse, pull her old dick out
and throw it on the table.
"Let's talk business, gentlemen."
"Aaah!"
Shit is scary as fuck.
If your best friend pitched that to you,
you'd be horrified.
"Yo, nigga, let's go to the hospital
and cut our dicks off
and make pussies out of them shits."
"What?!
Can't we just get matching jackets
or tattoos or something?
You sure that's what you want to do?"
"There's only way to find out, nigga.
Wu-Tang! Pow! Pow!
Let's go to the club
and trick niggas into fucking us. Yeah."
The third time I met OJ Simpson...
The third time I met OJ Simpson,
I was doing great in life.
I'd just finished the second season
of Chappelle's Show.
Man, those were good days.
I was playing a comedy club in Miami,
The Improv.
I don't know if you've ever been,
but if you have,
you'd know the door for the green room
is right on the stage.
Can you imagine such a thing?
If I walked out of the door
of the green room,
bam, I was right here,
right from the dressing room.
And I did that. I walked out,
and the whole crowd was like, "Hooray!"
And I looked...
ma'am, as close as you are to me...
I saw him as soon as I came out:
The Juice.
And I saw recognition in his eyes,
and it filled me with pride
that he knew who I was.
I didn't acknowledge his presence
because it was a white audience,
and I didn't want to start a panic.
But I did my show. The show went great.
I said, "Good night, everyone."
They all said, "Yay!"
And I didn't say nothing to OJ,
but I just gave him the signal
to let him know I knew he was there.
And I walked into the green room,
and OJ was already in there!
I was like,
"How the fuck is this possible?"
I was scared.
And then my friends came in,
and we all started talking.
We sat down on the couch.
And I'm just telling you what I saw
with my own eyes.
You can believe me or not believe me.
But in my experience, OJ Simpson...
one of the nicest men I'd ever met.
He was nice to me.
He was nice to my friends.
The conversation was filled with warmth
and levity, humor and wisdom.
We talked for 90 minutes,
and then suddenly, the Juice said,
"You know what? I've got to be going.
But it's good to see you again,
and I'm glad things went so well."
I said, "Thanks, Juice."
And my friends said,
"Yeah, goodbye, Mr. Juice."
They were new to the game.
He said, "No. Thank you...
for your hospitality. Good night, guys."
And we said, "Good night."
And he just walked out of the room.
And as soon as the door closed,
we all looked at each other like,
"That nigga did that shit.
Did you feel that?
I could feel like...
murder in the room."
Well, you young heads missed that shit.
You're all too young.
You don't remember that.
- How old are you, young, man? You.
- Twenty-four.
Twenty-four? You don't know shit.
You don't know shit!
You gotta Google shit
that I lived through.
See, this is why
I lock motherfuckers' phones up.
Seriously. Because the young kids,
you guys need to take a break from that...
We all need to break just
from that technology,
just for a minute.
You know, I'm from a different time,
young man. A dark time to you.
I'm from a time that I didn't even used
to know who was on the phone
until I answered the shit.
Like, when tragedy used to strike.
I remember I was 12 years old,
and the teacher wheeled a television set
into the classroom.
You remember these days?
And she turned it on
to one of three channels.
And she said,
"Class, the space shuttle is taking off,
and we're all gonna watch it take off."
Man, that shit was going great
for like, three to five minutes.
That's right. You remember.
It fucking exploded!
Right on television.
Everybody on board, dead.
Immediately presumed dead.
It was so bad, the teacher looked
at all the kids and was like...
"You can go home."
It was a goddamn national tragedy.
This was Cold War America.
The Russians were laughing at us.
My point is, for a guy your age
wouldn't even know the pain,
because in your generation,
it's like the space shuttle blows up
every fucking day.
How can you care about anything
when you know every goddamn thing?
I'm getting over one cop shooting,
and then another one happens,
and then another one happens,
and another one happens.
I'm crying about Paris,
and then Brussels happens.
I can't keep track of all this shit.
So you just give the fuck up.
That's the hallmark of your generation,
and that's fucked up,
because your generation lives
in the most difficult time
in human history.
This is the age of spin.
The age where nobody knows
what the fuck they're even looking at.
Did you know that Planned Parenthood was
for abortions?
It's for people
that don't plan things out at all.
That's right. So, a guy your age
doesn't really know how he feels.
Are you pro-choice?
Are you anti-consequences?
What does it all really mean?
It's easier not to care for you.
But for us, we were trained to care.
We were raised that way.
I used to watch a fucking cartoon
when I was growing up
called Care Bears.
It was about a fucking group
of teddy-bear people.
They were like teddy bears,
but they were like people,
and they were all different colors,
and they all fucking
just walked around, caring.
They cared about each other
and everything else.
They all had different designs
on their stomachs,
and the designs told you something
about what they might be like inside.
Very, very loving group of beings.
And when shit got real bad,
as nice as those teddy bears were,
they didn't get mean faces.
They got determined. Hmm!
And the leader would say,
"Come on, guys.
It's time for the Care Bear Stare!"
Remember that shit?
And them little teddy bears
would lock arms...
and stare at the problem...
and I'm not even bullshitting...
actual love would shoot out
of their chests...
and would dispel anything
that was fucked up.
And when we grew up,
we wanted to be like those bears.
And then we got our hearts broken,
because we found out
that life wasn't gonna let us do that
and that it's impossible
to shoot love out of your chest.
However, I have shot love
onto somebody's chest before.
I do it all the time.
It's the next best thing.
You kids don't know.
Your generation is just determined
to be angry, mad.
Everybody's mad.
Back when we were growing up,
only black people were mad.
Now everybody's just trying
to get in on the act.
I try to think to myself,
"When did everyone get mad?"
And then I realize
this happened before we were born.
This is a long way to go, but...
it probably started
in the Second World War.
Think about it.
All these black men,
millions of black men,
leave the United States
for the first time,
go over to Europe
with America's Armed Forces
and fight the Nazis
and make more money fighting Nazis
than they ever dreamed they would make
in the United States.
And a lot of those men,
while they were in Europe...
just to be real, not to be crass...
a lot of them probably got their dicks
sucked by white women.
I'm sorry, ladies and gentlemen.
This was World War II Europe,
and these were desperate times,
and penises were being sucked
for shoelaces and chocolate
and very frivolous things.
And it's very hard to come back to America
and sit on the back of the bus
after you've been in the South of France,
getting your dick sucked for a Crunch bar
or some crazy shit like that.
That's a life-changing experience.
And while that was happening in Europe,
here in America, for the first time,
women entered the workforce en masse,
by the millions.
All the men were gone.
Someone had to run the factory.
The ladies did it. That's right.
This was the first generation
of American women
to have independent income
en masse,
and when the men came back,
the women weren't the same.
American women had grown.
They were uttering phrases that no woman
on Earth had ever spoken before,
things like, "No" and "Shut the fuck up"
and "I don't feel like it."
And then behind the scenes of that,
there was a little-known government agency
that started testing mind control drugs
on the American public.
They fucked up.
They tested it for 12 years.
They didn't realize these drugs
were not mind-controlling.
They were mind-expanding.
It was LSD and mescaline
and shit like that.
And for the first time,
there was a new school of thought
that was chemically induced
that made people question
the very society they lived in.
By 1960,
the President of the United States
was only 42 years old.
Can you imagine?
DMX is older than that.
And he was gonna usher in a new era
of peace.
He was gonna avoid the Cold War.
He was gonna end segregation.
And they blew his fucking brains out
in front of everyone in Dallas.
This country was never the same.
There were seven more major assassinations
in the '60s.
Anyone that stood up and said anything
was shot down in the streets
like a fucking dog.
Kennedy, Kennedy, King, X, Evers,
on and on.
You didn't even have to be famous.
You could be a college student
at Kent State,
or in Mississippi,
protesting the Vietnam War,
and they shot them, too.
The '70s were a wild era.
And while all this was going on...
Bill Cosby raped 54 people.
Holy shit. That's a lot of rapes, man.
This guy's putting up real numbers.
He's like the Steph Curry of rape.
Man, that's a lot of rapes. Fifty-four?
If he had raped 30 less people...
that's still two dozen rapes!
Don't forget, each one of these rapes
has eight hours of sleep in it.
Ladies and gentlemen,
that's over 400 hours of rape.
It only takes 65 hours
to get a pilot's license.
If rapes were aircrafts,
this nigga is Top Gun for sure.
Yeah, that's a tough one.
And I was onstage not too long ago.
I was in Syracuse, New York.
Yeah. Well, yeah, for Syracuse.
But the show didn't go so good...
all because I was talking about Bill Cosby
a little bit.
Not a little bit. I'll be honest.
I talked about him for like, 25 minutes.
And a woman stood up
in the back of the room,
and she screamed out,
"You are a fucking asshole
for saying these things!"
"I know."
Instantly, I felt bad.
Not bad about what I was saying.
I just felt bad like, "Oh, that's too bad
she doesn't like the show."
I didn't realize it at first,
but not only did she say that,
she was rushing the stage.
By the time I saw her,
I just saw this shadowy figure
fucking charging up the aisle towards me
in full fight mode.
I was horrified. I said, "Oh, my God!
I'm gonna kick this bitch in the face."
Lucky for me, I didn't have to.
Security tackled her.
But it was a really
fucking horrifying scene.
A scuffle ensued. And then,
finally, she screamed out to me,
"Women suffer!"
I said, "I know."
And, ladies,
I need you to know... that I know.
I need you to know. Seriously,
there's a lot of men in this room
that identify themselves as feminists.
I would include myself in that.
Don't ever forget, we all have mothers
and daughters and sisters and wives,
and we want to see
all these women do well
and not be held back by their gender.
There's a lot of men like that
in this room.
There's a lot of men like that
in the world.
Or as we are known on the streets,
bitch-ass niggas.
But as this woman was wrestling
and screaming at me,
I started to take offense.
And I'll be honest, race was involved.
She was a young white woman.
Well-intentioned, but just not thinking it
all the way through.
"Bitch, how the fuck are you going to yell
at a black man about discrimination?"
She didn't get it. She just kept going.
"Women suffer!"
"I know."
"Women suffer!" "Same team."
"Women suffer!" "I know."
And this is when she went too far:
"We suffer just like you."
"Slow your roll, bitch.
You suffer, yes, but not like me.
Not like us."
She goes, "Suffering is suffering.
What's the difference?"
I said, "Come on, white woman,
you know what it is.
You was in on the heist.
You just don't like your cut."
You suffer, I suffer.
You suffer, I suffer. That's how it works.
Can't do comparative suffering.
If you're hungry, and your friend says,
"You know, people are starving in Africa,"
"So what, nigga? I still want lunch."
Black people know
about comparative suffering,
and you know that
it's a fucking dead-end game.
Blacks and Jews do that shit to each other
all the time.
You ever played Who Suffered More
with a Jewish person?
It's a tough game.
Whenever you think you've got
the Jewish guy on the ropes,
that motherfucker will be like,
"Well, don't forget about Egypt."
"Egypt?! God damn, nigga, I didn't know
we was going all the way back to Egypt."
What the fuck is wrong with her?
What does she think?
Does she think that I don't know
that rape is wrong?
Does she think that maybe
I don't have empathy
for Bill Cosby's alleged victims?
And I would be remiss
if I didn't remind you
that technically these are all
still allegations.
Although, I admit it looks very bad.
Perhaps if she looked at it correctly,
she would have empathy for me,
the man she was attacking,
a 42-year-old black comedian.
Obviously, Bill Cosby was a hero to me.
And she doesn't know what it feels like
to think that your hero
might've done something so heinous,
my God, you can't imagine.
It'd be as if you heard
that chocolate ice cream itself...
had raped 54 people.
You'd say to yourself,
"Oh, man, but I like chocolate ice cream.
I don't want it to rape."
Didn't want to believe it.
At first, I didn't believe it.
I said, "These people are obviously trying
to destroy Dr. Cosby's rich legacy."
Even 34 allegations into it,
I was still like, "Man...
he probably only raped ten or 11
of those people."
I know, I know. But it's really tough.
You guys are young.
Imagine if you found out 40 years from now
that Kevin Hart raped 54 people.
You'd be like, "Oh, my God."
The only one that would believe that
would be Katt Williams.
He'd be like, "I knew that motherfucker
was up to something!
I knew Kevin had raped those people."
You know,
I was mad at Kevin, too, though.
You know why? Okay, first of all,
I didn't even know
Kevin was as successful as he was.
I found that shit out the hard way.
I was at home when my son busted in.
He said, "Dad, I need $250."
He's only 12 years old, so I freaked out.
"What's going on, nigga?
Is somebody trying to kill you?"
He said, "No, no.
Kevin Hart's coming to town,
and I wanted to see his show."
I said, "How much are the tickets?"
He said, "They're $125."
I said, "God damn! Mine are only 80."
I said, "Why do you need $250, then?"
He goes, "Because I want to go
with you, Dad. Please?
And there it is.
So, I took him to the show.
And we go, we sit right up front.
The lights go down, and one opening act
after another goes on.
Then Kevin takes the stage.
The crowd goes fucking nuts.
Thousands of people. I was furious.
The longer the show went on,
the madder I got.
Because his show was fucking outstanding.
It was maddening. These people
were fucking holding their stomachs.
My son was slapping his knee.
I'm like, "Damn, nigga, I do this, too."
Kevin says, "Good night."
The crowd goes crazy.
And then everyone starts walking
to his door, and the lights come on,
and then my son is just standing there,
looking at an empty stage.
People are pushing past me,
and nobody's recognizing me.
I'm like,
"Man, this place fucking sucks!"
I said, "Come on, son,
let's get out of here."
Then my son looks back at me and says,
"Dad, please.
Please, I have to meet him."
I was like, "Oh, my God."
So, I took him backstage.
I've known Kevin for years,
but can you believe I was scared
to knock on his dressing room door?
I almost said...
"Son, I haven't seen him for a long time."
And one of Kevin's goons opened the door.
"Hey, what's up, Dave Chappelle?
What are you doing, man?
It's good to see you, brother.
What are you doing in this area?
This is a terrible area."
I'm like, "Actually, I live around here.
Listen...
is Kevin here?
My son just wanted
to meet him real quick."
"I don't know,
'cause Kevin's about to eat dinner."
Just then, Kevin came around the corner
to see who it was.
"What? Oh, shit! What's up, Dave?
Come on back.
I was just about to have dinner.
I don't know if you guys ate,
but you're welcome to join me
if you'd like."
And then my son pushed passed me.
It was some cold shit.
He goes, "Actually, Mr. Hart,
we haven't eaten in several hours."
Man, Kevin took us into his back room.
This guy had a fucking spread.
It was Tuesday night. This motherfucker
was having Sunday dinner.
There were steaks, chops,
corn with butter all over it.
My son was eating all fast,
embarrassing me.
I was like, "Slow down, son."
He was like...
Then I looked over in the corner,
and there was a box
of custom-made jerseys
for the local team.
Each one was hand-stitched,
and on the back,
they stitched on "K-Hart" on all of them.
Kevin saw me staring at that box,
and he went over
and grabbed one of them jerseys,
and he walked right to my son.
He said, "Hey, little man.
I want you to have this."
And my son was like, "Thanks, Mr. Hart."
This is when I got mad.
He goes,
"If your father ever makes you mad,
put that on."
And he walked out.
Oh, that was some cold shit.
Then I realized...
I looked up what Kevin made on Google.
I couldn't believe that shit.
Kevin is the first comedian
that a Drake song could be about.
Kevin could walk around his house
and sing "All Me,"
and the whole song would still be true.
"Got everything, I got everything
I cannot complain, I cannot
I don't even know
How much I really made
I forgot, it's a lot
Fuck that, never mind what I got"
And his wife will be like,
"Kevin, come to bed!"
He'll be like...
"Ho, shut the fuck up
I got way too much... "
You know how much money you have to have
to tell a girl to shut the fuck up?
I have "Quiet, please" money at best.
I'd have to take a loan out
for "Shut the fuck up."
"Shut the fuck up..."
That's Jay Z money.
And Beyonc got
"No, you shut the fuck up" money.
Let's not forget. Let's not forget.
I've never met Bill Cosby,
so I'm not defending him.
Let's just remember
that he has a valuable legacy
that I can't just throw away.
I remember that he's the first black man
to ever win an Emmy in television.
I also remember that he's the first guy
to make a cartoon with black characters
where their lips and noses
were drawn proportionately.
I remember that he had a television show
that got numbers equivalent
to the Super Bowl every Thursday night.
And I remember that he partnered up
with a clinical psychologist to make sure
that there was not one negative image
of African-Americans on his show.
I'm telling you, that's no small thing.
I've had a television show.
I wouldn't have done that shit.
He gave tens of millions of dollars
to African-American institutions
of higher learning,
and is directly responsible for thousands
of black kids going to college.
Not just the ones he raped.
Here comes the kicker. You ready?
Here's the fact that I heard,
but haven't confirmed.
I heard that when Martin Luther King stood
on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial
and said he had a dream,
he was speaking into a PA system
that Bill Cosby paid for.
So, you understand what I'm saying?
The point is this:
He rapes, but he saves.
And he saves more than he rapes.
But he probably does rape.
Thank you very much! Good night!
Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait!
I forgot.
The fourth time I met OJ Simpson.
The fourth time is not the funniest time,
but it was the last time
I'd see the Juice.
For some reason,
I was at the Kentucky Derby.
It's a very long story.
This is right after I quit
Chappelle's Show
in spectacular fashion.
There was a party hosted
by Michael Jordan,
and every athlete I've ever admired was
in that room.
Yes.
And then I saw a familiar face by the bar,
standing there, drinking alone.
It was Chris Tucker. Now...
you have to remember, at this time,
we were both technically missing.
And we went over,
and we're talking with one another,
and motherfuckers were amazed
to see us together.
Seeing me and Chris Tucker at that point
would be like seeing Bigfoot
riding a unicorn.
You wouldn't believe
that's what you were seeing.
And then, through all the gawkers,
a familiar face pushed through the crowd.
Here he was again.
The Juice.
He had his camera ready.
He was like, "Dave, Chris.
Good to see you guys.
Hey, come on, guys.
Let's all get together for a picture."
And at the same time,
me and Chris were like, "No.
I can't do that.
Sorry, Juice, my career is too flimsy
to survive a picture with you."
That's the end. Good night.
One last thing. Before you go,
I just wanted to acknowledge
for the real comedy fans.
We can't not acknowledge it.
We lost a fucking juggernaut
in comedy this week.
So, I'm just shouting out the family
and friends of Garry Shandling.
Much love to you guys.
My sincerest condolences.
And for the hip-hop fans
in the building...
put two fingers up in the air
for A Tribe Called Quest
and my man Phife Dawg.
May he rest in peace forever and ever.
Thank you for that beautiful music.
Good night, everybody. Thank you.
Twos up! Twos up!
Hands up, hands up! Twos up!
We're gonna do this for Phife!
I need everybody to rap with me right now!
I'm rich, biatch!