A Break From the Third Rail
By Eugene Robinson
Friday, May 20, 2005; Page A21
Why would comedian Dave Chappelle run away from mega-fame and mega-fortune to seek anonymity on an Indian Ocean beach, about as far from Hollywood as he could get? It's really not so hard to imagine. The genius that makes Chappelle the hottest comic in the country is being able to grab the electric third rail of American life and transmit its energy in a way that makes people laugh. Do that long enough and one of two things happens: You let go, or you get burned.
...According to Time, Chappelle became unsure about his material for the new season when a white visitor at a taping laughed especially hard and long over a sketch Chappelle performed in blackface. "When he laughed, it made me uncomfortable," Time quotes Chappelle as saying. His longtime writing partner is quoted as confirming that Chappelle had decided some of his material was not funny but "racist."
For me, this context makes Chappelle's flight from a $50 million payday so much more understandable.
It's one thing for a black comic to perform racially charged material that delights black audiences. A black audience takes it as pure satire or a kind of inside-the-family ribbing; slurs and stereotypes have no power as weapons of mass distortion. But how can you be sure that a white audience doesn't take the jokes as "proof" of ugly, buried, unacknowledged assumptions?
Maybe you shouldn't care. Maybe you just decide that intent is the important thing. You know what you meant by the joke, and people are rolling in the aisles. Who cares why they're laughing?
But if you're as thoughtful as Dave Chappelle, and you're serious about your conversion to Islam and you stop to ask the question, then maybe you have no choice. If you doubt the impact of your humor -- or worse, your own intent -- then maybe it's not a bad idea to take a break.
I'll be happy if Chappelle comes back soon to resume making me laugh till I cry. But I understand if he feels burned; I understand if, for a while, he needs to let go.
