He's in Denver tonight, cant wait to see the show, although I'm a lil scurred after the George Lopez incident and then Chappelle's incident, he's subject to go completely nuts tonight.
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"Nobody ever said they wanted to grow up to be a critic." -RP
"You know why my show is good? Because the network officials say you're not smart enough to get what I'm doing, and every day I fight for you. I tell them how smart you are. Turns out, I was wrong. You people are stupid."
It's harsh, but he's expressing a not uncommon issue comedians can have with their audience, especially when it expands to the size somebody like Chappelle deals with. I'd compare it to people yelling to The Man In Charge to do Mudbone, but at least Mudbone was intrinsically linked to Pryor and was a recurring character in his standup--Rick James was one skit among many.
It just seems like he's frustrated that what he loves to do most is being fucked up by overenthusiastic people with the wrong idea. I'm guessing it must be a claustrophobic feeling.
To me, he is a such a great standup that it'd be a shame if he stopped even for a moment.
You make a great point about the preservation of "the craft" It's interesting to see so many artist retreat so vehemently from what garnered their mass appeal. Prince won't do many of his older songs partly because of religious conviction but also because he says he's sick of playing them. Andy Kaufman refused to put up with his pigeonholing in regards to his Taxi character, it's a very strange phenomenon. I say fight it Chappelle!!! You don't want to be the next "DYNOMITE!!!!" or "What you talkin' bout Willis?"
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"Nobody ever said they wanted to grow up to be a critic." -RP
Good for Dave. Our society has become a sound clip society. Seems like the whole country has fucking ADD. Consequently, artists like Chapelle don't get appreciated for their whole body of work, but rather for one character. The idiots can't handle any more material than that.