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I Think Every Group Of Black Guys Should Have At Least One White Guy In It.

-Dave Chappelle

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I Think Every Group

Dave Chappelle

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I Think Every Group Of Black Guys Should Have At Least One White Guy In It.

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The Way The People Around You Position Themselves Around You To Get In Your Pockets And In Your Mind Is Infuriating To Me.

After A While, A Joke, If You Say It Too Much, Just Becomes Contrived, Or Fake-sounding.

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.

If I Can Make A Teacher's Salary Doing Comedy, I Think That's Better Than Being A Teacher.

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For One Year, I Want To Do This Thing Where I Guest-star On As Many Television Shows As I Possibly Can. I Love Television. The Fact That Television Ultimately Made Me Famous Was Very Gratifying For Me.

I'm Happier In The Way A Guy Gets Happier When He Starts To Mature. It Doesn't Make Things Easier, But I'm So Much Better At Handling Them.

Weed's Not As Bad As Everything Else... 'cause Weed Is A Background Substance. You Know What I Mean, You Can Smoke Some Herb And Still Function. You Ain't Crisp... But You'll Function.

The Hardest Thing To Do Is To Be True To Yourself, Especially When Everybody Is Watching.

Be True To Yourself

I Don't Want Anything Bad To Happen To The United States, But If North Korea Ever Drops A Nuclear Bomb On This Country, I Swear To God, I Hope It Lands In Hartford.

The Higher Up I Went, The Less Happy I Was.

I Have A Very Good Life, A High Quality Of Life. I Have Both Money And Time. No One Has That.

Dave! Relax! Close Your Buttcheeks!

When I'm On Stage, I Get Real Happy There. Maybe That's The Only Time In My Adult Life I Feel Like Myself.

My Generation Is Under-entertained.

If You Don't Have The Right People Around You And You're Moving At A Million Miles An Hour You Can Lose Yourself.

Losing Yourself

The Biggest Enemy Of An Artist Is Apathy... A Kid Gets Killed By The Police And I Buy A T-shirt And Before I Can Wear That One, There's Another Kid (killed) And I'm Running Out Of Closet Space.

I'm Famous Today. People Like Me Today. Might Not Like Me Tomorrow. You Can't Count On It.

I Don't Do Any Jokes That Old. I Might Have Maybe One Or Two Jokes From High School That I Still Do.

People Don't Know What It's Like Standing Up There Onstage, When You Have A Wall Of People Smiling At You.

The World Can't Tell You Who You Are. You've Just Got To Figure Out Who You Are And Be There, For Better Or Worse.

I Still Think People Do Have Racial Hang-ups, But I Think One Of The Reasons I Can Joke About It Is People Are Shedding Those Racial Hatreds.

One Of The Things That Happens When People Make The Leap From A Certain Amount Of Money To Tens Of Millions Of Dollars Is That The People Around You Dramatically Change.

Ralph Nader Has Slavery Reparations On His Platform, Which Makes Me Think He's Not Serious. If He Thought He Could Win He Wouldn't Even Say That.

Is This The 5:00 Free Crack Giveaway?

Everyone Around Me Says, You're A Genius! You're Great! That's Your Voice! But I'm Not Sure If They're Right.

Where I'm From? A Little Town Called None Of Yo God Damn Business.

I Don't Want The Money. I Don't Want The Drama. I Just Want To Do My Show. I Want To Have Fun Again.

If Someone Sits And Stares At You While You Eat, You Won't Even Eat The Way You Normally Do, Because It'll Make You So Uncomfortable. If I Look At My Dog When He's Eating, He Will Look At Me Like, "dave, I Will Bite You. What Are You Looking At? I'm Trying To Eat." It's Something That Dehumanizes A Person, Being On Display Like That.

New White People, You Can't Scare These White People, I Tried.

I Was Doing Sketches That Were Funny But Socially Irresponsible. I Felt I Was Deliberately Being Encouraged And I Was Overwhelmed.

It Seems Like There's Never Enough Famous White People Among Comic In Hollywood.

There's A Lot Of People Who Don't Want Anything From Me But To Laugh And Have A Good Time. You See Them At The Show And They Like - They Dress Up To Come See Your Show And Stuff. And They Pack These Auditoriums And It's A Lot Of Fun, Man. It's Like, This Is How I Started, And It's Still Fun For Me.

What Is Wrong With Me I Just Bought A Bag Of Weed From An Infant.

If I Put Forth A Legitimate Effort, Then I Feel Like, If That Doesn't Work Out, That's All I Can Do.

I Was 23. When You're 23, Your Concern Is Not For The Greater Good Of Humanity. I Didn't Feel Like I Was Unleashing An Evil On Society Or Anything. At The Time, That's What I Was Into, And I Did A Movie About It.

Why Don't You Click Your Heels Three Times And Go Back To Africa.

Everyone Who Wants To Make It In Comedy Goes To L.a., So A Million Comedians Fight For Time On Three Stages. If You Get In There In New York, You're Working Eight Times A Night Sometimes. Who's Going To Be Funny, The Guy Who Works Once A Week, Or The Guy Working Eight Times A Night?

I Think One Artist To Another Artist, The Best Compliment You Can Pay One Another, Because The Part Of You That Is Inspired Or Creates Something, To Write A Joke Or A Song, That's Like The God-like Part Of A Person.

I Don't Do Drugs, Though. Just Weed.

I Got My Hat Pulled Up Low And No One Can Really See Me. I'm Ducked Out. People Do Recognize Me, And I Have A Pretty Interesting Fan Base. It's A Diverse Group.

Comedy Is A Very Approval-oriented Field.

The Kid Is The Best Thing That Ever Happened To Me.

There's Not Too Many People That Don't Think I'm Crazy, For Walking Away From So Much Money. I'm At A Restaurant With My Wife, It's A Nice Restaurant, We're Eating Dinner. I Look Across The Room, I Say, 'you See This Guy Over Here, Across The Room? He Has $100 Million.' And We're Eating The Same Entree. So, Ok, Fine, I Don't Have $50 Million Or Whatever It Was, But Say I Have $10 Million In The Bank. The Difference In Lifestyle Is Miniscule.

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I Care About The Work I Do. But I'm Not Going To Say That Money's Not An Issue.

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The Only Thing Harder Than Leaving Show Business Is Coming Back.

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America, I Appreciate You Liking Me.

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I Got A Lot Of Positive People Around Me.

Positive People

I Felt In A Lot Of Instances I Was Deliberately Being Put Through Stress Because When You're A Guy Who Generates Money, People Have A Vested Interest In Controlling You.

I'm An Introspective Dude.

I Love The Fact That I Have A Show Where You Can Run Over A Kid And Everyone Busts Out Laughing.

Who Goes From America To Africa For Medical Attention?

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The Language You Are About To Hear... Is Disturbing.

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Fame For Me Is Like A Place, A Country I'm Taking A Tour Through.

I Think Every Group Of Black Guys Should Have At Least One White Guy In It.

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Jerry Seinfeld, He Was Doing Letterman Show All The Time, So He Kind Of Had An Excuse, That People Know The Jokes Already. He Didn't Have Time To Do Stand-up. A Guy Like Me, I Have No Excuses.

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No One Wants To Get Their Ass Beat To A Soundtrack.

Something About New York, Man: You Can Do More Comedy There Probably Than You Can Anywhere In The World. If You're Interested In Being Funny, New York Is The Place To Go.

Somebody Broke Into My House Once, This Is A Good Time To Call The Police, But Mm Mm, Nope. The House Was Too Nice. It Was A Real Nice House, But They'd Never Believe I Lived In It. They'd Be Like 'he's Still Here!

I've Been A Comedian Since I Was Fourteen. But I've Never Really Been A Ceo.

I Have All These Weird Fantasies. Going Coast-to-coast On My Motorcycle And Having Random Barbecues All Over America. No Show, No Nothing.

The Worst Thing To Call Somebody Is Crazy. It's Dismissive.

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Whether It Means Having A Show, Or A Movie, Or Just Being On A Stage, I Need An Avenue To Say What I Have To Say.

Stand-up Is The Kind Of Gig That'll Show You Where You're At.

I Don't Care If I Ever Work In Tv Again.

Most Of The People Around Me Have A Vested Interest In How Much Money I Make. You Know, So A Celebrity Could Find Themselves In A Position Where People Could Have Meetings About Their Life Without Them Involved. And When I Say "their Life" I Mean Not Their Professional Life Either. They Could Talk About Their Personal Life.

You Get Sick Of Jokes, You Know. Either I Do Them On Tv, And Then You Worry, Like, "oh, Everyone's Gonna See It," So You Chuck It, Or You Just Get Sick Of Saying It. After A While, A Joke, If You Say It Too Much, Just Becomes Contrived, Or Fake-sounding.

What That’s Allowed Me To Do Is Have A Vantage Point About My Own Life That's Accessible To People Still. I Could See A Guy Walking Down The Street And Be Like, Even Though I'm Famous, I Got More In Common With This Guy Than, Like, Brad Pitt.

I Always Take A Relationship To The Next Level. If That Works Out, I Take It To The Next Level After That, Until I Finally Reach That Level When It Becomes Absolutely Necessary For Me To Leave.

The Only Way You Can Know Where The Line Is, Is If You Cross It.

You Know, Be Able To Do Something Great In Your Life, You're Gonna Have To Realize Your Failures. You're Gonna Have To Embrace Them And Figure Out How To Overcome It.

At The Time, I Was Reading This Miles Davis Book, And He Was Talking About Coming To New York Right After He Was In High School. It Kind Of Made Me Feel Like, "yeah." I Didn't Want To Go To College; I Wanted To Do Stand-up. And I Figured, "what's The Point Of Doing Stand-up Around Dc? I'm Always Going To Be Under-appreciated There Because I Started There." I Felt Like I Was Strong Enough And Unique Enough That I Should Give It A Big Leash To Shine. New York Was The Best Thing That Ever Happened To Me As A Comedian.

I Wish I Had More Hands, So I Could Give Those Titties Four Thumbs Down!

I Love Being Famous - It's Phenomenal.

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My Wife Asked Me Once If I Weren't A Comedian, What I Would Do. I Couldn't Answer The Question. I Never Imagined Doing Anything Else.

I Just Like Seeing People. I Just Like Meeting People. I Like Finding Out New Walks Of Life And New Ideas.

I Don't Normally Talk About My Religion Publicly Because I Don't Want People To Associate Me And My Flaws With This Beautiful Thing. And I Believe It Is Beautiful Religion If You Learn It The Right Way.

I Got Married Recently. So Far, So Good. Less Sex Than I Expected, But Other Than That, It's A Pretty Good Lifestyle.

There's Something About Doing Stand-up That's Cathartic.

I've Done 10 Or 11 Pilots For Network Television, Which Is Ridiculous.

Because I Was Surrounded By So Much Negativity At Some Point That It Took Me Going Back And Doing Stand-up To Realize, You Know, People Really Like Me.

I Started When I Was 14. I Figured Out That's What I Wanted To Do When I Was 14. Even When I Was Six, I Can Remember People Telling Me, "you're Gonna Be A Comedian," And All This Stuff.

You Know You Must Be Doing Something Right If Old People Like You.

I Got Real Important Relationships In My Life That Are Very Empowering Relationships.

Important Relationships

You Can't Get Unfamous. You Can Get Infamous But You Can't Get Unfamous.

A Celebrity, Whatever I Am, You Get Cut Off Sometimes From People Just By Circumstance.

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