Dave Chappelle is a comedic, creative, and artistic force. He remains one of the only performers who when he speaks, everyone stops to listen. Nowhere was this better exhibited than in his Comedy Central sketch series, Chappelle’s Show, which ran from 2003 until he left the show in 2005. During this time, the show produced truly iconic sketches like Charlie Murphy’s True Hollywood Stories about Prince and Rick James, Clayton Bigsby, Wayne Brady’s Show, A Moment in the Life of Lil Jon, and more. The show became a massive hit for Comedy Central and firmly cemented Chappelle as one the artistic masters of the 21st first century—until he walked away from it all.
Chappelle’s Show is back in the news thanks to its recent return to streaming services. However, Chappelle himself is frustrated with the situation. On November 24, the comedian posted a video to his Instagram detailing his thoughts over the process in which his seminal series had been licensed out to various streaming platforms including Netflix, HBOMax, and CBS All Access. In the wake of this news Netflix—who Chappelle has worked with since 2016—has pulled the show from their service.
How did we get here? Chappelle’s frustrations with Comedy Central and its parent company ViacomCBS stretch back all the way into the early aughts. To provide a full and clear picture, we’ve assembled a timeline of events about Chappelle’s Show’s entire history and what came after the fallout. What you’ll see here still remains of Hollywood’s most interesting stories: how Chappelle had it all, walked away, and built something entirely new.
Date: Jan. 22, 2003
What Happened: The first episode of Chappelle’s Show debuts on the Viacom-owned Comedy Central and features the Frontline: Clayton Bigsby sketch. The Hollywood Reporter’s initial review was less than stellar, saying, “Chappelle's Show, a half-hour sketch series packed with potential, drops the ball in its premiere episode as one great setup after another falls flat in the delivery. There are some amusing moments, but the bits are mostly one-joke premises that wear thin too quickly, a la neo-Saturday Night Live.”
That review has aged very poorly.
Date: Jan. 21, 2004
What Happened: Fresh off a strong first season, the show’s sophomore season premiered and became an instant comedy classic.
Date: Feb. 11, 2004
What Happened: The famous “Charlie Murphy’s True Hollywood Stories: Rick James” sketch airs as part of the show’s fourth episode and launches the show fully into the general public’s consciousness. It’s only a matter of time before middle and high school gyms and hallways ring out with overquoted shouts of “I’m Rick James, bitch!”
Date: March 8, 2004
What Happened: A little under a month after the Rick James sketch aired, Comedy Central announced it had renewed the show for two, 13-episode seasons. "Comedy Central is the rightful home for Chappelle's Show and Dave's unique and provocative brand of humor," said Comedy Central’s original programming chief Lauren Corrao. The deal is reported to be worth about $50 million.
Date: June 18, 2004
What Happened: During a stand-up performance in Sacramento, California, someone in the audience repeatedly shouted, “I’m Rick James, bitch!” at Chappelle, interrupting the show. Chappelle left the stage for about two minutes before returning and stating that “The [Comedy Central] show is running my life” and that he didn’t enjoy working “20 hours a day.”
Chappelle went a step further and said, “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.” He also stated, “This (stand-up) is the most important thing I do, and because I'm on TV, you make it hard for me to do it.”
Local paper the Sacramento Bee wrote a full account of the evening’s events, including Chappelle making a rather humorous reference to Silence of the Lambs—and proving that he’s always been a big movie fan.
Date: July 6, 2004
What Happened: Comedy Central boasted about how Chappelle’s Show had boosted their ratings in a USA Today report, providing the network with their biggest hit since South Park debuted in 1998. The channel saw its ratings increase by 28 percent that year due to the strength of Chappelle.
‘Chappelle’s Show’ earns two Emmy nominations
Date: Dec. 21, 2004
What Happened: While it was later revealed that the comedian took a break due to stress, Comedy Central announced in December of 2004 that Season 3 would premiere on May 31, 2005, instead of February 2005. At the time, the network cited the fact that Chappelle had come down with the flu.
Date: May 4, 2005
What Happened: Just a few weeks before the premiere of Season 3, Comedy Central announced that the show would not hit its intended release date and that production had been suspended “until further notice.” At the time, Chappelle himself didn’t provide a statement.
Date: May 14, 2005
What Happened: About 10 days later, Entertainment Weekly and the New York Times reported Chappelle had left the US for South Africa back on April 28, 2005, to enter himself into a psychiatric facility. Time Magazine eventually caught up with the comedian who stated he’d left to be “in a quiet place” for a while and that he was not on drugs.
Chappelle went on to cast blame on some unmentioned people in his inner circle as the cause of his stress: “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 said. "Everyone around me says, 'You're a genius!'; 'You're great!'; 'That's your voice!' But I'm not sure that they're right."
The thing that really seemed to break Chappelle was the “Black Pixie” sketch. He stated that during the sketch’s filming, a white spectator was watching and laughed loud and long. At this point, Chappelle wondered if he was reinforcing stereotypes instead of satirizing them. "When he laughed, it made me uncomfortable," says Chappelle. "As a matter of fact, that was the last thing I shot before I told myself I gotta take f****** time out after this. Because my head almost exploded."
In a random footnote to all this, it was revealed in a 2019 interview with Netflix that none other than a young John Mulaney(!) delivered the news to Comedy Central president Doug Herzog that Chappelle had left. Furthermore, Mulaney then traveled to Los Angeles to recover production tapes of what bits of Season 3 Chappelle had recorded.
Date: Summer 2005
What Happened: In a dinner with Comedy Central president Doug Herzog, Chappelle expressed hesitation to return to the show saying that fame was getting to him. The comedian went as far as to say that he “wanted to be wrong again, sometimes, instead of always being right.”
Charlie Murphy declares the show done; co-creator leaves
Chappelle clears the air with Oprah
View this video on YouTube
Date: Feb. 3, 2006
What Happened: During an appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show, Chappelle stated that his departure hinged around losing creative control, burnout, and an uncomfortable working environment. However, he said he’d be willing to produce the remainder of the third season if his demands—one of which was that half the show’s DVD sales would go to charity—would be met.
For context, even in 2004, the first season of Chappelle’s Show had sold 2 million units. That made it the best-selling DVD of all time, according to a USA Today report.
Date: Feb. 12, 2006
What Happened: In an interview on Inside the Actors Studio with James Lipton, Chappelle stated that his father’s death also contributed to his departure. By throwing himself into the show’s production, he didn’t have time to process fully. “I would go to work on the show, and I felt awful every day, that's not the way it was. ... I felt like some kind of prostitute or something. If I feel so bad, why keep on showing up to this place? I'm going to Africa. The hardest thing to do is to be true to yourself, especially when everybody is watching.”
Date: July 9, 2006
What Happened: Comedy Central decided to air the remaining episodes despite Chappelle’s warnings that he’d close the door on a return if they moved forward. Charlie Murphy and Donnell Rawlings took over hosting duties for the final few in-studio recordings, with the last episode airing on July 23, 2006.
Date: Nov. 21, 2016
What Happened: Post-Chappelle’s Show, the comedian would mostly stay out of the public eye. In 2013, he toured where he famously left mid-show during an appearance in Hartford, Connecticut, after an audience member insisted on shouting Chappelle’s Show lines at him. Chappelle also headlined 10 night’s worth of shows at Radio City Music Hall in June of 2014.
A few weeks after hosting Saturday Night Live—for which he’d win an Emmy—it was announced that Chappelle had signed a deal with Netflix. The streaming services would release 3 new specials at the rate of $20 million per special.
First two Netflix specials are released
Date: Dec. 31, 2017
What Happened: Toward the end of December, Netflix announced that Chappelle would release four specials instead of three. The third, Dave Chappelle: Equanimity, was set to drop at the end of 2017 and was joined by a surprise fourth special called Dave Chappelle: The Bird Revelation.
Equanimity was filmed in Washington, D.C., while Bird taped in Los Angeles. Both specials would go on to win Grammy awards; Equanimity would win an Emmy. Critics were less enthusiastic, taking issue with how Chappelle’s comments about transgender men and women.
Date: Aug. 26, 2019
What Happened: Released in August 2019, Sticks & Stones marked the fifth collaboration between Netflix and Chappelle. Filmed in Atlanta, Georgia, the special would win another Grammy and another Emmy for the comedian.
Much like Equanimity and Bird, critics pushed back about the special’s content, specifically highlighting Chappelle’s approach to cancel culture and the #MeToo movement. Aja Romano of Vox said that the special made a point “of punching down” to mixed results.
Netflix releases ‘8:46’
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Date: June 12, 2020
What Happened: Released via Netflix’s social media, 8:46 was an impassioned speech from Chappelle on the murder of George Floyd. Complex called the raw performance “a half-hour therapy session” and “heavy, poignant stuff—an unprecedented response during unprecedented times.” Re-watching it months later, it still resonates deeply.
Date: Oct. 30, 2020
What Happened: Towards the end of October, Netflix and HBO Max announced that both streaming services had acquired the licensing rights to Chappelle’s Show for both their platforms. For HBO Max, it marked a continuing relationship between WarnerMedia and ViacomCBS and expanded the amount of Comedy Central offerings on the service.
Chappelle mentions ‘Chappelle’s Show’ streaming on second 'Saturday Night Live' appearance
![Date: Nov. 7, 2020
What Happened: In his opening monologue on Saturday Night Live, Chappelle makes mention of the fact that while Chappelle’s Show is now streaming on both Netflix and HBOMax and that “[I] didn’t get paid for any of it.”
The information came in the middle of a story about Chappelle’s great-grandfather, who was a freed slave that went on to have a career in the AME Church. After mentioning the streaming situation, Chappelle then remarks that his great-grandfather would probably think his great-grandson had been “bought and sold more times” than he had.](https://img.youtube.com/vi/Un_VvR_WqNs/mqdefault.jpg)
View this video on YouTube
Date: Nov. 7, 2020
What Happened: In his opening monologue on Saturday Night Live, Chappelle makes mention of the fact that while Chappelle’s Show is now streaming on both Netflix and HBOMax and that “[I] didn’t get paid for any of it.”
The information came in the middle of a story about Chappelle’s great-grandfather, who was a freed slave that went on to have a career in the AME Church. After mentioning the streaming situation, Chappelle then remarks that his great-grandfather would probably think his great-grandson had been “bought and sold more times” than he had.
