The official myspace of Dave Chapelle
Early Life
Chappelle was born in Washington, D.C. His father, William David Chappelle III, was a professor at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio. His younger brother is named Abdi. His mother, Yvonne K. (née Reed), was a professor at Howard University and the University of Maryland and is also a Unitarian Universalist minister. Chappelle grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland and attended Woodlin Elementary school. During young Chappelle's formative years, his comic inspiration came from various comedy idols, particularly Eddie Murphy and Richard Pryor. On Inside the Actors Studio, he also cited Bugs Bunny as one of his earliest influences, praising voice actor Mel Blanc.
After his parents separated, Chappelle stayed in Washington with his mother while spending summers with his father in Ohio. In June 1991, he graduated from Washington's Duke Ellington School of the Arts, a renowned performing arts high school, where he majored in theatre arts.
Early works
Chappelle moved to New York City to pursue a career as a comedian. He gathered the courage to perform at Harlem's famed Apollo Theater in front of the infamous "Amateur Night" audience. The performance resulted in him being booed off the stage. Chappelle has described the experience as the moment that gave him the courage to continue his show business aspirations. He quickly made a name for himself in the New York City comedy circuit, even performing in the city's parks. At the age of 20, Chappelle made his film debut as "Ahchoo" in Mel Brooks's Robin Hood: Men in Tights. That same year, he had a small but showy role in the film Undercover Blues. On the strength of his performances in these films, Chappelle was offered the role of Bubba in Forrest Gump, which was in a pre-production stage. Not realizing the impact this future Academy Award winner for Best Picture would have, and concerned about what seemed to be a racially demeaning character, he turned down the part. He has since admitted to regretting the decision. Chappelle played another supporting movie role in 1994's little-seen Getting In. He attracted the attention of TV network executives with his guest appearance in an episode of ABC's highly rated sitcom Home Improvement. The storyline had Chappelle and real-life friend comedian Jim Breuer ask Tim Taylor for advice on their girlfriends. The characters' single outing in the episode proved so popular that ABC decided to give them their own spin-off sitcom titled Buddies. However, after taping a pilot episode, Jim Breuer was fired and replaced with actor Christopher Gartin. Buddies premiered in March 1996 to disappointing ratings. The show was cancelled after only four episodes out of thirteen that were produced. Nine years later, in May 2005, ten of the episodes were released on a single-disc DVD to capitalize on Chappelle's new-found fame.
He later appeared as the nightclub comedian in The Nutty Professor starring Eddie Murphy, one of his major comedic influences. He also had minor roles in Con Air and Martin Lawrence's Blue Streak. He co-wrote (with Neal Brennan) and starred in Half Baked, a cult film about a group of pot-smoking best friends trying to get their friend out of jail.
Chappelle appeared as himself in an episode of The Larry Sanders Show, in which he and the executives of the show's nameless television network satirized the treatment that scriptwriters and show creators were subject to, as well as the executives' knee-jerk stereotyping when it came to race. In 1998, he played a supporting role as Tom Hanks' character's friend and confidant in You've Got Mail.
Chappelle's Show
In 2003, Chappelle debuted his own weekly sketch comedy show on Comedy Central called Chappelle's Show. The show parodied many aspects of American culture including racial stereotypes, politics and pop culture. Along with comedy skits, the show also featured musical performances by mostly hip-hop and soul artists. Chappelle's pointed social and political commentary quickly helped the show garner critical and commercial success as well as controversy. Richard Pryor, one of Chappelle's comedic influences, was a fan of the show and stated that he had "passed the torch" to Chappelle. He received two Emmy nominations for the show.
Additionally, the DVD set, Chappelle's Show Season One Uncensored!, became the best-selling DVD of a television show to date, overtaking the previous best-selling, The Simpsons first season DVD. It had sold over 3 million copies. Due to the show's popularity, Comedy Central's parent company Viacom reportedly offered Chappelle a $55 million contract (giving Chappelle a share of DVD sales) to continue production of Chappelle's Show for two more years while allowing him to do side projects. Chappelle had stated that sketches are not his favorite form of comedy, and that the characteristics of the show's format were somewhat like short films.
Return
Later in the year, Chappelle performed impromptu stand-up shows in Los Angeles. He then went on a tour which began in Newport, Kentucky which is not far from his Ohio home. He also made a surprise appearance on HBO's Def Poetry where he performed two poems, titled Fuck Ashton Kutcher and How I Got the Lead on "Jeopardy!." He was interviewed for Inside the Actors Studio on December 18, 2005 at Pace University's Michael Schimmel Center for the Arts. The show premiered on February 12, 2006. Chappelle stated that the death of his father in 1998 had an impact on his decision to go to South Africa. By throwing himself into his work, he had not taken a chance to mourn his father's death. He also said the rumors that he was in drug or psychiatric treatment only persuaded him to stay in South Africa.
He continued:
“ I would go to work on the show and I felt awful every day, that's not the way it was. ... I felt like some kind of prostitute or something. If I feel so bad, why keep on showing up to this place? I'm going to Africa. The hardest thing to do is to be true to yourself, especially when everybody is watching. â€
Chappelle also said that he felt some of his sketches were "socially irresponsible". He singled out the "pixie sketch" in which pixies appear to people and encourage them to reinforce stereotypes of their races. In the sketch, Chappelle is wearing blackface and is dressed as a character in a minstrel show. According to Chappelle, during the filming of the sketch, a white crew member was laughing in a way that made him feel uncomfortable and made him rethink the show. Chappelle said "it was the first time I felt that someone was not laughing with me but laughing at me."
During these interviews, Chappelle did not rule out returning to Chappelle's Show to "finish what we started", but promised that he would not return without changes to the production, such as a better working environment. He also stated he would like to donate half of the DVD sales to charity. Chappelle expressed disdain at the possibility of his material from the unfinished third season being aired, saying that to do so would be "a bully move", and that he would not return to the show if Comedy Central were to air the unfinished material. On July 9, 2006, Comedy Central aired the first episode of Chappelle's Show: The Lost Episodes. An uncensored DVD release of the episodes was made available on July 25. Subsequently, it is highly unlikely that Chappelle will ever return to Comedy Central.
Chappelle has stated that he has no intention of leaving Yellow Springs, Ohio, his current residence. "Turns out you don't need $50 million to live around these parts, just a nice smile and a kind way about you. You guys are the best neighbors ever", he stated at a blues and jazz festival in the town in mid-September 2006, "That's why I came back and that's why I'm staying."
Dave Chappelle's Block Party
The site of Dave Chappelle's Block Party in Brooklyn.Chappelle was the subject and producer of the Michel Gondry-directed documentary Dave Chappelle's Block Party which chronicles a Chappelle-hosted event in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn on September 18, 2004. The highlight of the event was the reunion of popular '90s rap group The Fugees. Chappelle toured several cities in February and March 2006 to promote the film under the moniker "Block Party All-Stars featuring Dave Chappelle". Universal Pictures' genre division Rogue Pictures released the film in the United States on March 3, 2006.
Personal life
Chappelle converted to Islam in 1998 and is a Muslim. He does not announce this publicly, having stated that he does not want people associating his "flawed self" with Islam, which he says is "beautiful".
Chappelle has commented on being a computer and video game enthusiast, some of his favorites being NBA Street, Street Fighter and Grand Theft Auto. He has paid homage to various video games in a few of his sketches. One was to Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, in which he plays the main character, who steals a car to go to work. Another is when he is playing "Street Hoops" with a kid who has cancer in the hospital. In a sketch about a posthumous Tupac Shakur song, a lyric mentions "run up in yo' spot like CJ from San Andreas."
Chappelle is also capable of playing at least two jazz standards, "'Round Midnight" and "Misty," on piano, as seen in his film Block Party and the television series Iconoclasts.
He lives with his wife Elaine and two sons, Sulayman and Ibrahim, on a 65-acre farm, which he calls " you Hollywood farm", just outside Yellow Springs, Ohio. When he is not touring or engaged in filming for television or the big screen, Chappelle can be seen in the shops and markets of the small college town known as a countercultural center.
