Since leaving the spotlight in 2005 at the peak of his Chappelle Show success, comedian Dave Chappelle has left many wondering how someone on top of the world could just walk away from it all.
After jumping back on the stand-up circuit, it seems as if the famed comic is finally back. After being placed on GQ Magazine’s December “Man of the Year” cover, the comic sat down to discuss why he left, his thoughts on Donald Sterling, life in Ohio, the state of his friendship with Chappelle Show co-writer Neal Brennan and more.
Available nationally on November 25, read below for a few quotes from the interview:
Via GQ:
“You know, for a while, I was kind of sequestered. Well, sequestered is not the right word. It was more like Superman’s self-imposed exile. People are always like, ‘I heard you moved to Africa.’ And in reality I was only there for about two weeks.”
“I have a show-business bucket list. There’s just certain things that every entertainer always dreamed of doing. When I was 19, I used to walk up Sixth Avenue and look at the marquee of Radio City. I’d see the lines outside. I’d be like ‘Man, I just want to…Radio City!’…It just so happened the venue was open during the same time frame I was willing to play.” “For one year, I want to do this thing where I guest-star on as many television shows as I possibly can,” he explains. “I’d be a zombie on The Walking Dead. A corpse on CSI. I’d be the first black guy to f### Olivia Pope on Scandal…”
“The fact that television ultimately made me famous was very gratifying for me. Chris Tucker did it in movies and Chris Rock did it from his stand-up, which was very impressive. But you know, the thing that people most will remember me for is Chappelle’s Show. If I were to never do anything else, that show would be a culmination of what was a very long and tedious process of me learning how to be in the television business.”