Dave Chappelle Stand-Up Monologue – SNL (2022) | Transcript

Original air date: November 12, 2022

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Ladies and gentlemen, Dave Chappelle.

[Cheers and applause]

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Thank you. Thank you very much for being here. Before I start tonight, I just wanted to read a brief statement that I prepared.

[Laughter]

“I denounce anti-Semitism in all its forms.”

[Laughter]

“And I stand with my friends in the Jewish community.”

And that, Kanye… is how you buy yourself some time.

[Laughter]

[Cheers and applause]

I got to tell you guys, I probably been doing this 35 years now. And early in my career, I learned that there are two words in the English language that you should never say together in sequence, and those words… are “the” and “Jews.”

[Laughter]

I’ve never heard someone do good after they said that.

[Laughter]

Kanye’s gotten into some scrapes before. Normally when he’s in trouble, I pull up immediately. But this time, I was like, “You know what? Let me see what’s going to happen first. I just want to see — just want to see where this is all going.”

[Laughter]

I can’t even remember how it started. Vaguely I remember it started with a tweet, strange tweet. It was like, “I’m feeling a little sleepy.”

[Laughter]

“I’m going to get me some rest, but when I wake up, I’m going to go DEFCON 3 on the Jews.”

[Laughter]

And then he just went to bed. I was up all night worried. What is he gonna do to the Jews?

[Laughter]

I grew up around Jewish people. I have a lot of Jewish friends, so I’m not freaked out by your culture. I know a little bit about it just from hanging around. Be like, “Yo, yo, let’s go out after school tomorrow.” They’d be like, “We can’t go out. It’s Sha Na Na tomorrow.” I’d be like, “What?”

[Laughter]

What is Sha Na Na? I had so many questions. Why do some of your people dress like Run-DMC?

[Laughter]

When Kanye woke up from that nap, he went to work.

[Laughter]

A year ago, I’d seen him on a podcast called “Drink Champs.” Great show, and it was an amazing appearance. Noreaga and them were there, rappers that I love, and they all had their gold chains and stuff on. And Kanye said, “Only millionaires wear chains.” They said, “What?” He said, “I’m a billionaire. Billionaires don’t wear their money on their body.” I took my chain and I said, “Oh, snap.”

[Laughter]

That’s right. It was a good appearance. It was fun and funny. But when he woke up, he went on “Drink Champs” again. This time, he was on one, mad about something. He said, “I can say anti-Semitic things, and Adidas can’t drop me. Now what?” Adidas dropped that n*gga immediately.

[Laughter]

Ironically, Adidas was founded by Nazis, and they were offended.

[Laughter]

I guess the student surpassed the teacher.

[Laughter]

It’s a big deal. He had broken show-business rules. It’s just a rule. You know, the rules of perception. If they’re black, then it’s a gang. If they’re Italian, it’s a mob. But if they’re Jewish, it’s a coincidence and you should never speak about it.

[Laughter]

Kanye got in so much trouble, Kyrie got in trouble.

[Laughter]

[Applause]

Kyrie Irving posted a link to a movie that he had seen on Amazon. No caption on the post or nothing like that. But apparently this movie had some, I don’t know, anti-Semitic tropes or something. It was some weird title like “From Hebrew to Negro” or something.

[Laughter]

And the NBA told him he should apologize, and he was slow to apologize. And then the list of demands to get back in their good graces got longer and longer. And this — this is where, you know, I draw the line. I know the Jewish people have been through terrible things all over the world, but you can’t blame that on black Americans. You just — You just can’t.

Whoo!

You know what I mean? Thanks, the one person that said “Whoo.”

[Laughter, applause]

A fair punishment would be he should just post a link to “Schindler’s List” and y’all write your own captions.

[Laughter]

Kyrie Irving’s black ass was nowhere near the Holocaust. In fact, he’s not even certain it exists.

[Laughter]

I saw one news pundit screaming about Kanye. She said, “Mental health is no excuse for that type of language.” Yes, it is, bitch. You would kill somebody if you’re mentally ill. Listen, okay, I don’t think Kanye is crazy at all. I think he’s possibly not well.

[Laughter]

I’ve been to Hollywood. Don’t want y’all to get mad at me. I’m just telling you. I’ve been to Hollywood. This was just what I saw. It’s a lot of Jews.

[Laughter]

Like, a lot.

[Laughter]

But that doesn’t mean anything. You know what I mean? There’s a lot of black people in Ferguson, Missouri. Doesn’t mean we run the place.

[Laughter]

[Applause]

I can see if you had some kind of issue. You know what I mean? You might go out to Hollywood. And your mind might start connecting some kind of lines, and you could maybe adopt the delusion that the Jews run show business. Not a crazy thing to think. But it’s a crazy thing to say out loud in a climate like this.

[Laughter]

Now the midterms are over, and it’s a crazy climate. And I got to tell you, I feel like this midterm was like all of humanity depends on it. And it’s an ominous sign. The most ominous sign of the midterms, I believe, would be Herschel Walker, who I — I don’t want to speak badly of because he’s black. But I have to admit… he’s, um… he’s observably stupid.

[Laughter]

[Cheers and applause]

Even when he’s not talking, his mouth be open a little bit, like…

[Laughter]

He’s the kind of guy that looks like he thinks before he makes a move on tic-tac-toe.

[Laughter]

And watching the news now, they’re declaring the end of the Trump era. Now, okay, I can see how in New York you might believe this is the end of his era. I’m just being honest with you. I live in Ohio amongst the poor whites.

[Laughter]

A lot of you don’t understand why Trump was so popular. But I get it, ’cause I hear it every day. He’s very loved. And the reason he’s loved is because people in Ohio have never seen somebody like him. He’s what I call an honest liar. I’m not joking right now. He’s an honest liar. That first debate — That first debate, I’d never seen anything like it. I’ve never seen a white male billionaire screaming at the top of his lungs. “This whole system is rigged!” he said. And across the stage was a white woman, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama sitting over there looking at him like, “No, it’s not.” I said, “Now, wait a minute, bro. It’s what he said.” And the moderator said, “Well, Mr. Trump, if, in fact, the system is rigged, as you suggest, what would be your evidence?” Remember what he said, bro? He said, “I know the system is rigged… because I use it.” I said, “God damn!”

[Laughter]

And then he pulled out an Illuminati membership card and chopped a line of cocaine up and did it right at the podium.

[Laughter, applause]

No one had ever heard someone say something that true. And then Hillary Clinton tried to punch him in the taxes. She said, “This man doesn’t pay his taxes.” He shot right back, “That makes me smart.”

[Laughter]

And then he said, “If you want me to pay my taxes, then change the tax code, but I know you won’t because your friends and your donors enjoy the same tax breaks that I do.” And with that, my friends, a star was born. No one had ever seen anything like that. No one had ever seen somebody come from inside of that house outside and tell all the commoners, “We’re doing everything that you think we are doing inside of that house.” Then he just went right back in the house and started playing the game again.

[Laughter]

Democrats were sore losers. I’m a Democrat, and I’m telling you, as soon as he won, they started saying all that — “He’s colluding with Russia. He’s colluding with Russia.” It was very embarrassing as a Democrat. But as time went on [Sighs] we all came to learn… he was probably colluding with Russia.

[Laughter]

I even look at his wife different now. His wife is beautiful, no question about it. But she looks like the kind of chick that James Bond would smash but not trust.

[Laughter]

[Applause]

Why he got all them documents at his house? What is this? This a guy that’s famous for not reading his press briefings. Now all of a sudden he got 10,000 documents at his house, gonna catch up on his reading list.

[Laughter]

I have been fired from jobs many times in my life, and I will be very honest with you. Sometimes when I was fired, I stole things from the office. Staplers, computer mouses, all kinds of stuff. But you know what I never stole from work? Work.

[Laughter]

[Cheers and applause]

War in Ukraine brought it all into focus. And lucky for everybody in the Western world the Ukrainians are way better fighters than we thought they’d be. I mean, these guys… God bless them. They’re doing good.

[Cheers and applause]

They killed 10,000 Russians the first week of the war. Even the Vietnamese were like, “God damn. Them some good numbers!”

[Laughter]

This was before they had weapons. Before we started sending them weapons, they was killing Russians with things you can find around the house. That whole country, Ukraine, is littered with traps like Home Alone. They were stepping on rakes and touching hot doorknobs. “Aah!”

[Laughter]

How is Russia losing to the Ukraine? That would be like America losing a war to Colorado.

[Laughter]

Now the midterms are over, and everybody’s awake. These new whites, man, they’re like — The whites are like — They’re like — They’re like newborn babies, just woke up. Everything white people mad about, we’ve been on that. “Man, I can’t feed my family.” Black people like, “We been on that!” “Man, we can’t trust the government.” We been on that. “Man, we should dismantle the FBI.” Word to Martin Luther King, bro. We’ve been on that.

[Cheers and applause]

Nobody listens to me. When I tell these jokes, you ignore me. My first Netflix special, what did I say? I said, “I don’t want a sneaker deal, ’cause the minute I say something that makes those people mad, they’re going to take my sneakers away.” And the whole crowd was like, “Ha ha ha ha ha ha.” Now you see Kanye walking around L.A. barefoot with his chain out.

[Laughter]

This guy lost a billion and a half dollars in a day. A billion and a half dollars in a day. I saw that and I said, “Put your chain on, n*gga. Welcome back.”

[Laughter, cheers and applause]

It shouldn’t be this scary to talk about anything. It’s making my job incredibly difficult. And to be honest with you, I’m sick of talking to a crowd like this. I love you to death, and I thank you for your support. And I hope they don’t take anything away from me.

[Laughter]

Whoever they are.

[Laughter]

We got a great show tonight!

[Cheers and applause]

Brooklyn’s finest Black Star is in the building!

[Microphone thuds]

[Cheers and applause]

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