# What happened to Dave Chappelle? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 6, 2010, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365 "2010-08-06T03:29:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![pepperlandgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f17d59/32.png) [@pepperlandgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pepperlandgirl)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2010, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/41 "2010-08-07T20:22:12Z")
> [@antia](#): > > > [@acsenray](#): > > > > The stuff about weed comes from his own mouth. > > In what context and when, before 98? After that it is hardly likely since he became a muslim, and he certainly doesn’t hang around town doing such a thing. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that he quit smoking, but I saw him at the Improv right after the end of the 1st season and he was quite, quite high during his show (he also indicated he didn’t want to do a 2nd season, and I wasn’t shocked when he bailed on the 3rd). ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2010, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/42 "2010-08-07T20:31:03Z")
> [@MTCicero](#): > > What was meant (I believe) was what I stated earlier, viz.: This region of the state is overwhelmingly socially conservative. So to have a hippie utopia in the midst of said reactionary region is a bit out of the ordinary. Most of the “artist colonies” I’ve known were usually in very conservative areas (Fairhope, Alabama/Buford, Georgia/Black Mountain North Carolina, etc.). I haven’t researched it but I think several of them startedout as a place where the like minded could group together for community. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2010, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/43 "2010-08-07T21:56:06Z")
> [@antia](#): > > > [@acsenray](#): > > > > The stuff about weed comes from his own mouth. > > In what context and when, before 98? After that it is hardly likely since he became a muslim, and he certainly doesn’t hang around town doing such a thing. In the context of interviews and standup in which he described situations in which he and his friends were high. Why would he “hang around town doing such a thing”? People generally don’t walk around in public stoned. > [@astro](#): > > I think some of it may be biologically based mental issues, but IMO just from what I’ve seen and read over time of musicians, comedians, actors and other celebrities behaving erratically, the vast majority of this “crazy” behavior is simply due to chronic drug abuse. Unfortunately the majority of these reveals usually come out after the celebrity is dead, and their buddies and associates begin telling their tales of the departeds massive drug use. What crazy behavior are you talking about? So far as I am concerned, unless it’s corroborated by a reputable source, the TMZ report is fiction. > [@MTCicero](#): > > > [@acsenray](#): > > > > Utter rubbish. It’s as home-grown as anything else in that part of Ohio. > > What was meant (I believe) was what I stated earlier, viz.: This region of the state is overwhelmingly socially conservative. So to have a hippie utopia in the midst of said reactionary region is a bit out of the ordinary. I and all my socially liberal friends, relatives, and acquaintances from southwestern and west-central Ohio would be astonished to learn that the region is “overwhelmingly socially conservative.” Greene County votes heavily Republican, like most rural counties, but all kinds of people live in the region, enough to support the existence of a small, artsy village with a liberal bent. There’s nothing “out of place” or “out of the ordinary” about it. Most generally rural and conservative areas have enough artsy-liberal types to support some kind of progressive subgroup within them. Yellow Springs happens to be just a couple of miles from a major urban area, a source of even more non-socially conservative people, as well as the home of a (currently defunct) liberal arts college, several of which form centers of social progressivism all over the state. ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2010, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/44 "2010-08-07T23:49:24Z")
My impression: 1. Comedy central took a chance on giving a bunch of young comedians their own show (Chappelle, Carlos Mencia, etc.) 2. Chappelle’s show was much better than people expected. 3. Comedy Central gave him a new contract and huge bonus. 4. Cahppelle snapped under the pressure and had a nervous breakdown because he didn’t make any shows under the new contract. He left after the new contract was signed with 2 episodes left on the previous season. That’s why CC had to do a clip show with the rest of the cast (who were also still under contract.) Nothing he’s done so far seems to be anything other than a nervous breakdown. I hope he gets better, but I really doubt his stated reason for quitting the show should be taken as the Word of God. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/45 "2010-08-08T00:34:15Z")
> [@MTCicero](#): > > > [@Captain\_Midnight](#): > > > > He has a large farm in Yellow Springs, Ohio (what does the term ‘Yellow Springs’ come to mind mentally for you?) His father was a teacher at Antioch College and he says that he loves the area and the quality of life. Ohio seemed like a strange place to want to retire, since it is so cold there and somewhat economically depressed. > > > > I think he did what I would do if I was in his shoes. Make a lot of money and then when you have enough that you can retire and live within your means, you can live free and do as you want. The only things I would indulge in weathy that I cannot now is traveling the World. After that, I would live the life of an upper middle class person with a house, TV, computers. I’d live in Washington State ( **again, Ohio, why?** ) > > I live about 40 minutes south of Yellow Springs. If I’d never seen the place, I, too, would probably wonder “why Ohio?” Having been there countless times, though, I can assure you that it is a wonderful, beautiful little farming community, and the citizenry (certainly the faculty and students of Antioch college) tend to be more socially progressive than is common for this area of Ohio (and that’d definitely be a selling point for me). > > Plus, Yellow Springs has [Young’s Jersey Dairy](http://youngsdairy.com/). Is that the place that used to make the incredible blueberry milkshakes with real blueberries in it? I went to Yellow Springs once with a college BF who was going to Wittenburg, and there was some sort of frat picnic going on there. Pretty little place and very friendly feeling. ---
**Author:** ![Crafter\_Man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crafter_man/32/458_2.png) [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/46 "2010-08-08T01:24:11Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > Utter rubbish. It’s as home-grown as anything else in that part of Ohio. Look, I’m 42 years old, and I’ve lived in the Dayton/Springfield area my whole life. Have visited Yellow Springs countless times. (I \*love \*Peach’s Grill. Best beer selection around.) And Yellow Springs is very atypical for Ohio. Even I - as a conservative/libertarian - love the place. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/47 "2010-08-08T02:28:17Z")
Yellow Springs would be unusual no matter where in the world you put it. It’s not particularly unusual in southwestern Ohio. And, as I mentioned before, Ohio has a long tradition of liberal college town surrounded by conservative farmland. (I’m the same age as you as lived my whole life in that area before work took me away.) ---
**Author:** ![MTCicero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a4c791/32.png) [@MTCicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MTCicero)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/48 "2010-08-08T02:36:38Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > I and all my socially liberal friends, relatives, and acquaintances from southwestern and west-central Ohio would be astonished to learn that the region is “overwhelmingly socially conservative.” Then you and your friends are either frighteningly naïve, or you’re being deliberately obtuse. ---
**Author:** ![MTCicero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a4c791/32.png) [@MTCicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MTCicero)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/49 "2010-08-08T02:38:25Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > It’s not particularly unusual in southwestern Ohio. Now, _that’s_ utter rubbish. ---
**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/50 "2010-08-08T13:35:51Z")
> [@Tahssa](#): > > I saw an interview he did, maybe “Inside the Actors Studio”, where he said one reason he left was the racist skecthes they were doing. He said something like during the first season it was all in fun and they were just goofing around but in the second season people were taking the sketches the wrong way. > > He said early in the show when they did those type of sketches peoples attitudes were like, “Haha it’s funny that you guys are making fun of that stereotype.” and later some peoples attitudes changed to, “Haha that sketch is funny because the stereotype is true.” or something like that and he said that bothered him. I don’t believe the racist sketch story for a second (what, they guy had no influence over the sketches in his own show?) but I’m inclined to cut him a break. I think the real reason was either nervous exhaustion or a crisis of confidence in his own abolity to be continually funny, and that’s not the sort of stuff you own up to on national TV. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/51 "2010-08-08T14:08:30Z")
Its a shame Dave didn’t try to go another season or two with a less racist spin (as he saw it at least). The few skits I remember that were LMAO funny didn’t seem to be particularly racist. The “everything looks cool when slowed down”. The basketball game challenge with Prince. The “pee pee on you, pee pee on me” parody rapper video. The time Dave goes cruising with the “real” Wayne Brady. Seems to me that crew had the ability come up with funny stuff, where it just happened to be funny stuff being acted out by black folks and not so much funny because it WAS being done by black folks. I felt the same way about some of the best stuff on In Living Color. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/52 "2010-08-08T14:20:51Z")
> [@aldiboronti](#): > > I don’t believe the racist sketch story for a second (what, they guy had no influence over the sketches in his own show?) He wrote the sketch himself. He was saying that he noticed that the reactions to the sketch were not what he intended. His intent was to mock racial stereotypes. Instead, he found that he was reinforcing them. That’s what made him rethink his show. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/53 "2010-08-08T17:40:39Z")
> [@MTCicero](#): > > > [@acsenray](#): > > > > It’s not particularly unusual in southwestern Ohio. > > Now, _that’s_ utter rubbish. Of course it isn’t. Perhaps you misunderstand my usage of “particular.” Almost all rural areas include some kind of artsy-liberal community. American communities are not homogenous. > [@MTCicero](#): > > > [@acsenray](#): > > > > I and all my socially liberal friends, relatives, and acquaintances from southwestern and west-central Ohio would be astonished to learn that the region is “overwhelmingly socially conservative.” > > Then you and your friends are either frighteningly naïve, or you’re being deliberately obtuse. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/54 "2010-08-08T17:47:04Z")
> [@MTCicero](#): > > > [@acsenray](#): > > > > It’s not particularly unusual in southwestern Ohio. > > Now, _that’s_ utter rubbish. Of course it isn’t. Perhaps you misunderstand my usage of “particular.” Almost all rural areas include some kind of artsy-liberal community. American communities are not homogenous. > [@MTCicero](#): > > > [@acsenray](#): > > > > I and all my socially liberal friends, relatives, and acquaintances from southwestern and west-central Ohio would be astonished to learn that the region is “overwhelmingly socially conservative.” > > Then you and your friends are either frighteningly naïve, or you’re being deliberately obtuse. No, we are aware that the Dayton area is a major metropolis that us reasonably diverse with two major universities and that the diversity is sufficient to prevent the region from being “overwhelmingly” anything. You only find overwhelming majorities when you slice and dice the area into isolated subgroups Of course Air Force personnel tend to be conservative (although not exclusively so), and rural high-income residential communities also, bit there is major city that you’re neglecting when you trench the analysislike that. Liberal and artsy types aren’t some kind of rare, lonely species that desperately cling to each other in a single hippie village. ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/55 "2010-08-08T19:28:32Z")
> [@antia](#): > > > [@Oregon\_sunshine](#): > > > > OMG I used to live there!!! > > “Yellow Springs” brings to mind images of beautiful woods, waterfalls, hiking trails, Glen Helen, Clifton Gorge, natural food stores and vegetarian restaurants (even in the 80s!!) and dirty Ohio hippies playing Frisbee Golf… > > I live here… It’s nowadays a thriving arts town, voted [top ten coolest small towns in America](http://www.budgettravel.com/bt-dyn/content/article/2008/08/02/AR2008080201224.html)by Budget Travel, Best small town this year by Ohio Magazine. > [Chamber of Commerce](http://www.yellowspringsohio.org/index.shtml) has the links. This is bizarrrre… do we really have THAT many dopers from YS, OH? Oh, wait – they probably self-selected based on the thread title. But still… Y’know, you should probably keep your wonderfulness on the down low. I love it that people think of 20’ snowdrifts when they hear of our little burg in Wisconsin. Keeps the “soulless coasties” away. But every once in a while it’ll show up on one of those “Best Places To Whatever, Maybe Own A Ten Speed, In America” lists, and then I fear for our secret… ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/56 "2010-08-08T20:17:21Z")
Yeah, well, like rest of the region, it’s sweltering in the summer and freezing inthe winter. There are floods, tornados, mosquitos, sleet, and thunderstorms. Those hoping for mild sun and cool breezes aren’t going to be leaving Venice Beach or Waikiki to move to Greene County, Ohio. (Hope that helps!) ---
**Author:** ![thirdname](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d07c76/32.png) [@thirdname](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thirdname)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/57 "2010-08-08T21:11:03Z")
He was brought down by the Dark Crusaders. ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2010, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/58 "2010-08-08T22:01:43Z")
I was thinking about this thread, and come to think of it, what great comedian hasn’t had a nervous breakdown? Other than Seinfeld, I don’t know of too many that didn’t turn to drugs or have an “insane period.” ---
**Author:** ![DoctorJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doctorj/32/2904_2.png) [@DoctorJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DoctorJ)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2010, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/59 "2010-08-09T22:54:07Z")
> [@Drain\_Bead](#): > > The Rick James bit wasn’t even remotely the funniest thing on that show. > > I bring you this gem: > > [That R. Kelly sure is a pervert!](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LpzJqpEWyjk) I almost have to feel a little bit bad for R. Kelly, because despite his long and arguably illustrious music career, when I hear his name this is the song that comes to mind. I’m sure I’m not alone. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2010, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365/60 "2010-08-10T01:55:54Z")
> [@Superhal](#): > > I was thinking about this thread, and come to think of it, what great comedian hasn’t had a nervous breakdown? Other than Seinfeld, I don’t know of too many that didn’t turn to drugs or have an “insane period.” “The melancholy men are of all others always the most witty.” Aristotle [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-dave-chappelle/549365.md?page=4)