David Khari Webber Chappelle was born August 24, 1973, in Washington, D.C. His father was a professor and dean of students at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, and his mo…
David Khari Webber Chappelle was born August 24, 1973, in Washington, D.C. ◦ His father was a professor and dean of students at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, and his mother, Yvonne Seon, worked for Congolese prime minister Patrice Lumumba, is a Unitarian Universalist minister, and was a professor of African American Studies. ◦ By the time he was 14 years old, Chappelle was in nightclubs mastering an adult world. ◦ After high school he moved to New York. ◦ He moved to Yellow Springs and lived a reclusive life after leaving *Chappelle's Show* in 2005. ◦ He has lived in Yellow Springs, Ohio off and on for decades. ◦ Chappelle won six Grammy Awards for Best Comedy Album and received the 2019 Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. ◦ In 2016 he signed a $20-million-per-release special deal with Netflix. ◦
Chappelle views stand-up comedy as an incredibly American genre. ◦ He believes that no other country could produce this many comedians and that every opinion in the United States is represented in a comedy club by somebody. ◦ He holds that the First Amendment is first for a reason and that the Second Amendment is just in case the first one doesn't work out. ◦ He will fight anybody that gets in a true practitioner of the art form's way, because he believes the practitioner is conveying truth and the obstruction is wrong, referring to the art form rather than the content. ◦ He describes comedians as like a nation's kidney, helping everyone metabolize not just facts, but feelings around facts or ideas, with jokes as a shorthand for all of that. ◦ He calls culture the best export the United States has. ◦ He sees himself as an ambassador of American culture. ◦ His mother told him, "Son, sometimes you have to be a lion so you can be the lamb you really are." ◦ She also told him he should be a griot, a person in Africa charged with keeping the stories of the village, and filled him with every story of black life. ◦
After high school, Chappelle moved to New York, was booed off the Apollo's Amateur Night stage, and called that the moment that gave him the courage to continue. ◦ He walked away from *Chappelle's Show* in 2005. ◦ ◦ He explained that on the sketch that prompted his exit, a white spectator laughed particularly loud and long, and the laughter struck Chappelle as wrong; he wondered if the bit had crossed from sending up stereotypes to merely reinforcing them. ◦ He insisted he was not walking away over money, stating, "I drive a Toyota. My lifestyle hasn't changed at all." ◦ Nevertheless, he said, "Fifty million dollars is a lot of money. And what I'm learning is I am surprised at what I would do for $50 million. I am surprised at what people around me would do for me to have $50 million." ◦ He has said that if you don't have the right people around you and you're moving at a million miles an hour, you can lose yourself. ◦ He noted that everyone around him says, "You're a genius!"; "You're great!"; "That's your voice!" but that he is not sure they are right. ◦ He defended performing in Saudi Arabia against the charge that the money was dirty. ◦ In 2020, he released the performance special *8:46* on Netflix's YouTube channel with no prior announcement. ◦ In it, he argues that the people in the streets needed to lead and that celebrities should follow, not the reverse. ◦ He made the capital investment to house the local NPR member station WYSO in a 150-year-old schoolhouse he owns, saying the place's relationship with the community "preexists my career." ◦
Chappelle understands the role of the griot, a person in Africa charged with keeping the stories of the village, and notes that when a griot dies it's like a library was burned down. ◦ He models his own duality through his mother's advice that sometimes you have to be a lion so you can be the lamb you really are. ◦ He conceives of black American communication as bilingual, operating in street vernacular and job interview registers. ◦ He frames comedians as a nation's kidney, metabolizing facts and feelings for the culture. ◦
Chappelle is a stand-up comedian and practitioner of an art form he says saved his life. ◦ He won six Grammy Awards for Best Comedy Album and received the 2019 Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, considered America's highest comedy honor. ◦ He left *Chappelle's Show* in 2005. ◦ He released the 2020 special *8:46* about violence against African Americans. ◦
Chappelle says he does not court provocation but does not flinch from it, describing himself at the core as a filthy nightclub actor who started in smoky rooms in D.C. ◦ He says he talks "just like a lion" and is not afraid of anyone when it comes word to word, and that he will gab with the best of them just so he can chill and be himself. ◦ He also says he was a soft kid, sensitive, cries easy, and would be scared to fistfight. ◦ He knows comics that are very racist, watches them on stage, doesn't get mad at them or hate them, and sometimes even appreciates the artistry that they paint their racist opinions with. ◦ He has said that every black American is bilingual, speaking street vernacular and job interview. ◦
Chappelle presents himself as simultaneously a soft, sensitive kid who cries easy and is scared to fistfight, and as a fearless lion who will gab with the best of them word to word. ◦ He walked away from a reported $50 million deal, yet admitted he was surprised at what he would do for that sum and what people around him would do for him to have it. ◦ He insisted his lifestyle had not changed at all, noting, "I drive a Toyota," while simultaneously revealing the corrupting gravitational pull of massive wealth. ◦ He is surrounded by voices telling him he is a genius with a singular voice, but he is not sure they are right, and states, "I'm not crazy. I'm not smoking crack. I'm definitely stressed out." ◦ He says he does not court provocation, yet he does not flinch from it. ◦ He defends performing in Saudi Arabia by reframing the critique of dirty money through the lens of American currency bearing slave owners. ◦
Chappelle suggests that sometimes you have to be a lion so you can be the lamb you really are, implying that engagement may require passing through a performative ferocity to reach a softer core. ◦ He warns that if you don't have the right people around you and you're moving at a million miles an hour, you can lose yourself, signaling the importance of a grounded, honest circle. ◦ He argues that the people in the streets needed to lead and that celebrities should follow, not the reverse, indicating a preference for grassroots direction over celebrity-driven leadership. ◦ He considers journalists the arbiters of baseline reality and comedians the metabolizers of national feeling, so engagement with his work requires understanding jokes as shorthand for facts and feelings around ideas. ◦