Comedian Dave Chappelle will be taking his recently-produced documentary about his pandemic comedy shows to ten U.S. cities after various film festivals blacklisted him amid controversy over his Netflix comedy special.
Though Dave Chappelle typically keeps his stand-up shows under tight wraps, on Monday, he posted a brief five-minute video to his Instagram of him talking about all the controversy that arose after Netflix aired his recent comedy special, The Closer, which heavily mocked elements of the LGBTQ community over its stranglehold on free speech.
At one point, Chappelle mentioned a documentary he created during the pandemic that he says was blacklisted by various film festivals after his special aired.
“This film that I made was invited to every film festival in the United States and some of those invitations I accepted. When this controversy came out about ‘The Closer,’ they began disinviting me from these film festivals,” Chappelle claimed. “And now, today, not a film company, not a movie studio, not a film festival, nobody will touch this film.”
Watch below:
“Thank God for Ted Sarandos and Netflix, he’s the only one that didn’t cancel me yet,” he said.
The cancelation has not and will not stop Dave Chappelle, who told his audience that he will be airing the documentary in 10 cities.
“Am I canceled or not?” he asked the audience, who unanimously shouted, “No!”
Directed by Oscar-nominated filmmakers Julia Reichert and Steve Bognar, the “Untitled” documentary will airing in the following cities and will feature appearances by Dave Chappelle:
11/4 San Francisco
11/7 Minneapolis
11/9 Des Moines
11/12 Indianapolis
11/14 Cleveland
11/15 Toronto
11/17 Cincinnati
11/19 Columbus
11/21 Atlanta
11/22 New York
In the same video, Chappelle also addressed the trans Netflix employees who recently walked out in protest of his special, telling them that he while will always grant them an audience, he will not be “summoned” by their demands.
To the transgender community, I am more than willing to give you an audience, but you will not summon me. I am not bending to anybody’s demands. And if you want to meet with me, I’d be more than willing to, but I have some conditions. First of all, you cannot come if you have not watched my special from beginning to end. You must come to a place of my choosing at a time of my choosing, and thirdly, you must admit that Hannah Gadsby is not funny.
Though Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos has pledged to keep Chappelle’s special on the platform, he told Variety last week that he “screwed up” when addressing his 2SLGBTQQIA+ employees.
“I screwed up that internal communication. I did that, and I screwed it up in two ways,” Sarandos said. “First and foremost, I should have led with a lot more humanity.”
“I had a group of employees who were definitely feeling pain and hurt from a decision we made,” he added. “And I think that needs to be acknowledged up front before you get into the nuts and bolts of anything. I didn’t do that.”
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