assemble your crew
My favorite line this season was from the skit where he shows how he handled things during different periods of his life. He just lost a movie role to a guy his kid called “Hilarious.” To his kid:
“Well [so and so, I forgot the name] just ran off with your school clothes money! I’m broke, niggar, I’m broke!”
I just couldn’t stop laughing. Still can’t.
White Supremacist. Crackhead lecturing class of children.
Not just is Chapelle willing to poke fun at all ethnic groups, including his own, but he also has the ability to get other people to do it to themselves. For example, Carson Daly as the host of TRL ten years down the road, fat, with a bald spot in his semi-mullet (the sketch where Dave buys the camera that will let him see Ten Years in the Future/Who the Person Last Slept With/Something Else I can’t Remember).
My favorite line from the Niggar sketch, though, was in the restaurant: “I bet you’ll get the best table a nigger’s ever got in here.”
I’ve been a big fan of Dave Chapelle when he was just doing stand-up (“Anybody here ever made that joke about having a gun when going through the metal detector at the airport? Don’t do that, y’all.”). But he’s really kicked up his creativity a notch on this show. I can’t find fault with either season. His first season was more of a feeling-out, see-what-he-can-get-away-with sorta thing. But genius.
And yes, Charlie Murphy should get his own show.
So many classic lines in the Niggar Family sketch.
“She’s got those Niggar lips!”
“I know never to get between a Niggar and his pork!”
“That Niggar boy is such a good athlete. And so well-spoken.”
“Niggar, please!”
My my my. Maybe the best part was the joy Chapelle’s milk man character got out of saying ‘nigger’ to this clueless white family.
The racial draft was amazing, too.
[Dave as Tiger Woods]: I’ve always wanted to say this… fa schizzle.
[Dave as commentator]: We’ve just received word that Tiger Woods has lost all his endorsements. Sorry, Tiger. There’s always FUBU!
dave chappelle is a comedic genius. i’ve seen probably half of last season’s shows, and there was barely a bad sketch in the lot of them. which is saying a lot, because even good sketch comedy shows usually get maybe half of them right.
he does a great job of tackling the whole race issue while keeping it fresh and only slightly uncomfortable. the race draft was classic, a stroke of genius. the spoof on kinkos pretty much sums up all retail sales. “the niggars” pretty much put all lame racial stereotypes to rest. and this year’s rick james extravaganza was downright hilarious. i tried to explain it to a friend, but me saying “i’m rick james, bitch” for some reason doesn’t quite do it justice…
oh, and i forgot to say, big ups to comedy central for airing chappele’s show with apparently little network censoring. i always think i’m watching hbo during the show, which is a huge compliment. it’s nice to see another network pushing boundaries and putting out original stuff.
To those of you who didn’t know about Chappelle before his show, or to anyone else who hasn’t seen it:
You NEED to watch his comedy routine Killing Them Softly.
It’s funnier than anything I have ever seen in my life. It’s funnier than Eddie Murphy’s Raw, It’s funnier than any of Chris Rock’s shows…I’m a bit young to say that he’s funnier than Richard Pryor, but for my money KTS is easily the best routine of the last 20 years. HBO still plays it occasionally.
It isn’t available to buy as a CD but a little birdie just told me you may be able to find it on that ting on the net where you can find other audio things. Hmm.
The above post is mine – didn’t check to see who was logged in.
That’s the one with the bit where he’s talking about his limo driver making a personal stop in a bad neighbourhood with him still in the car, right? (It’s near the end of the show, IIRC.) The 3 year old selling him pot was classic. (Not classy…classic.)
Limo Driver on the phone (from memory so be kind) “oh hello…what? WHAT? NO NIGGER HELL NO! FUCK THAT NIGGER…I’m on my way. click hold on I gotta make a stop”
That’s my favorite part of that whole show. You would just feel doom shoot through you if your driver did that.
I hope they keep doing the Chalie Murphy stories. The fact that they’re true is what makes them so hysterical. That and the way that Charlie tells them, his little throwaway lines are killer.
“The first person I saw was OJ Simpson. I said damn. that’s OJ Simpson. Man he’s got a big f—ing head.”
“Even in the old days when slapping was fashionable…there was a gunfight after that. Somebody had to go.”
(On Prince’s outfit) “It looked like something a figure skater would wear.”
“What are you looking at me for? You know where you got that shirt…and it wasn’t at the men’s department.”
I loved the way he was so insistent that the Prince story was true, “how could I make up some shit like that? I dare you to play Prince one on one in basketball.”
It’s east to see how a guy like Charlie could keep a crew mesmerized and in stitches with these stories as well as why Chappelle would see them as goldmines for sketches.
Just watched the Rick James ep again. Another line (I missed it the first time):
“He called us Darkness cos we was the blackest n*ggers on the planet at the time. Until Wesley Snipes came along.”
Charlie has a great delivery. Hopefully, we’ll see more stories from him.
I whole-heartily agree with this. Killing Them Softly is one of the funniest sets I’ve ever heard.
I was surprised it didn’t immediately propel him into “Chris Rock” type fame, like Rock’s first HBO special did for him.
Chappellle has the potential to outlast Rock. Chappelle’s Show should prove that to any naysayers.
He takes chances I don’t think Rock would. The writing is brilliant and as funny, if not funnier, than 95% of anything currently on the air.
I hope he can handle the success. Look what happened to Eddie Murphy. A huge string of really bad movie choices.
I see that season one will be released on DVD on Tuesday. I’m buying a copy if for no other reason than the black white supremacist sketch from the first episode.
I laughed my ass off at that.
“Is this the five-o’clock free crack giveaway?”
White Girl singing: “Actually, everyone who isn’t black, pretty much looks the same to me”
The Real Sex street interview:
Q: “What was the most daring thing you’ve ever done sexually?”
Woman: “Oh, I guess it was back in college, when I had sex with two guys at once!”
Q: “And you, sir?”
Man: “Well, now I guess it was having sex with old Gang Bang here without a condom! This date’s over!”
And let’s not forget the R. Kelly “I Wanna Pee On You” video
Playing basketball with Prince had me rolling. “They came out wearing the same clothes they had on before!”
“Game…Blouses.”
The WacArnolds skit is hilarious too. “Forget WacArnolds, you’re cut off! You want WacArnolds you have to go through me!”
That and the ad in the paper for the TYRONE BIGGUMS $450,000 CRACK PARTY". Him putting his head, white lips and all, in the ad just kills me.
If this show, specifically the Rick James episode, doesn’t win an Emmy for writing, then there is absolutely no justice in the entertainment world.
Mr. Blue Sky, I was just telling my husband that the other day. The Charlie Murphy True Hollywood Stories sketch should at least be nominated for an Emmy. I doubt it will, though, what with the liberal use of the word nigger and all.
Shoot the J. Shoot it!!!
Was the older Rick James really Rick James? I couldn’t tell for sure if it was Chappelle in a lot of makeup, or the actual Rick James.
Funny, I was going to post a message about it today. haha