Chappelle's Show

From TeeVeePedia, the Internet TV Encyclopedia.

Chappelle's Show was a wildly popular Comedy Central comedy series starring funk singer Rick James as Dave Chappelle, the host and lead writer of a sketch comedy series. Interspersed with fictional sketches from the show-within-a-show, the series followed Chappelle's attempts to deal with the increasing pressures of fame and the day-to-day business of running a television show. As the series progressed, the writers brilliantly added a metafictional element, having the character of Chappelle grow to believe that he was actually James himself. His frequent protests of "I'm Rick James, bitch," were always greeted by other characters with laughter, only increasing the character's feelings of being trapped in his own success.

Production of the series was tragically cut short in 2005 by James' unexpected death. However, Comedy Central plans a spinoff centered around the blaxploitation-themed superhero who appeared in several of the show's more popular fake sketches. Superfreak, starring singer and comedian Wayne Brady, is expected to premiere in fall 2006. In the meantime, Comedy Central has hastily assembled a few sad piecemeal episodes from scenes filmed before James' untimely passing but never aired. Ironically enough, nearly all of the scenes involve the Chappelle character criticizing his network for its blind, all-consuming greed, while standing neck deep in a pile of $100 bills.