The comedian Dave Chappelle was attacked on stage at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles last night. Chappelle was appearing as part of the comedy festival, Netflix Is A Joke.
During his set, a man rushed on and tackled the performer. Clips posted to social media show him throwing himself violently at Chappelle, who fell onto his back.
#davechappelle attacked at #hollywoodbowl #netflixisajoke pic.twitter.com/oP04S0de90
— abazar 🦇🔊 (@abazar) May 4, 2022
According to Variety, the attacker then got up and tried to run from the stage. However, security personnel swiftly descended and dragged him away, joined by actor Jamie Foxx, who’d been watching the set from the wings.
Chappelle later thanked Foxx from the stage, before adding: “I’ve been doing this 35 years. I just stomped a [person] backstage. I’ve always wanted to do that.”
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Unconfirmed video later emerged of the attacker outside the venue, being carried on a stretcher into an ambulance. He appeared to be conscious.
Related: LGBTQ celebrities react to Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars
After the incident, Chappelle quickly regained his composure and went on to joke with the crowd, “It was a trans man”.
Many LGBTQ advocates (such as advocacy group GLAAD) have criticized Chappelle for comments he made in his 2021 Netflix stand-up show, The Closer, regarding trans people. In it, Chappelle called himself a member of “team TERF” (Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist) and stated, “gender is a fact”.
Others have claimed that despite some of his material, Chappelle is sympathetic to the hardships facing many trans people. In The Closer, he talks of his friendship with a trans woman, the comedian Daphne Dorman, who killed herself in 2019.
Related: Netflix reinstates trans employee who complained about Dave Chappelle’s show
Also present at last night’s event was Chris Rock, who performed a set earlier in the evening. After the attack on Chappelle, Rock came on to the stage to quip, “Was that Will Smith?”
A Hollywood Bowl spokesperson told PA Media, “The incident that occurred at the Hollywood Bowl on May 3 2022 is an active investigation and we are unable to comment further at this time.”
Here is a video of the aftermath. #DaveChappelle handled this like a champ! #HollywoodBowl pic.twitter.com/0xaBpWsbrT
— E5QUIRE (@e5quire) May 4, 2022
LegionKeign
Jesus, he’s an asshole.
Cam
So a random person attacks him and Chapelle takes the opportunity to again attack the Trans community.
Polaro
Did he? Maybe you should be more concerned that someone physically attacked him over words.
marxist_homo
It was a joke. If that constitutes an attack on the trans community, then you and the trans community are even more sad and humorless than I thought.
Also, it’s possible that the attacker–whether or not he’s trans–is just mentally unstable, but it’s equally possible that part of what motivated him to resort to violence was the response of trans people and their advocates to Dave Chapelle. If, as some have been arguing for a long time, right wing nuts who say hateful things about minorities are at least partly responsible when their followers commit acts of violence against minorities, then the same is true here.
Cam
@Polaro Maybe HE should have been ore concerned about being attacked than about using it as an excuse to once again attack trans people.
@marxist_homo, We already exposed this as one of your right wing troll screenames months ago. But thank you for coming in to defend Chapelle. IF the right wing, anti-LGBTQ troll is defending him, it cements my opinion.
James
Dave Chappelle and Jamie Fox are pieces of shit.
MISTERJETT
what did Jamie do?
Inspector 57
N—-r, I jus stomped some n—-r, n—-r.
This is a guy who’s selling out shows to rabid fans, and Netflix is selling itself out to make money off this garbage.
Goddamn. Save us all.
Terrycloth
Sorry , I never found Dave even remotely funny. I could list 15 who are funnier..he mumbles alot and his sentences fade off..I think he has a serious case of homophobia and transphobia. He hasn’t learned from.his last remarks..he needs to be educated on lgtbq+ issues…id ike to know what the few jokes were before he got ran into…attacked. ? More like goat butted yes there was a real knife on a fake gun.
Dave better rewrite his act
PoetDaddy
It shouldn’t be possible for a member of the audience to attack a performer, but DAMN Dave Chapelle is a monstrous asshole. If anyone deserves it, he does. #boycottDaveChapelle
BigJohnSF
He’s a brilliant comedian. He refrains from blowing smoke up anybody’s ass – so of course he’s a monster. Nobody on here seems to have any problem with the fact that he was physically attacked while performing.
ggontarek
Because he then ASSUMED, being a derelict of a person, jokes that it was a trans man. Get real. Someone else should have jumped him for saying that afterwards you toad.
mailliw110
I’m just amazed he admitted to being tackled by a person he considers to be a female!
SFMike
Careful, to criticize these third rate “comics” gets you accused of racism.
inbama
Like a lesbian labeled a “terf’ for not wanting to service a “ladydick?”
Kangol2
You know that by bringing race into this where there was no cause for it you sound like a racist jack@ss.
Ken A.
Love him or not, he shouldn’t have been attacked. So toxic, such appalling behavior from the LGBT community, no wonder some are distancing themselves. Free speech is free speech. Deal. I’m one who is distancing themself unless this abhorrent behavior ceases, it will be a shame to the community. So shameful.
Jaquelope
Has it been absolutely *proven* that it was a trans man who attacked him, or is it just speculation?
Kangol2
The person does not appear to have been trans. He is a rapper who released an album and song named after Chappelle. Dave Chappelle just attacked trans people out of pure @ssholery.
mailliw110
So he let a female attack him?
Cam
@Ken A
I see the right wing troll is trying to lie and claim that the “LGBT Community” attacked him. Sweetie, you are so obvious the Real Housewives of wherever would tell you to tone down the look.
Polaro
I think he is funny and insightful. He’s not setting public policy. Some of his jokes don’t work for me, nothing unusual there. You can choose to take offense at jokes, but I would say you are the problem. This is the kind of paper thin skin nonsense that people hate about the left. There are ramifications for being perpetually offended. Keep giving them examples of why to hate us. It sure isn’t working yet.
Jaquelope
It isn’t just the Left that has thin skins. The Right has their share of them, too. For example, MTG and a joke made after the Oscars’ event.
Polaro
Not racism…a total lack of humor, a thin skin, and the self-entitlement to think you can silence someone you don’t like.
Kangol2
What is this nonsense about racism? His attacker was Black/Blasian! Why are you bringing racism into this? Dave Chappelle has turned into a rich troll. He should not have been attacked but by the same token he should not be kicking down at trans people, who catch constant hell every single day! And Dave Chappelle is earning millions from Netflix specials so NO ONE is silencing him.
johncp56
Glad nothing got bloody, or he hurt, from what I seen today the guy had a fake gun with a knife in it wow
Kangol2
The attacker should not have attacked Dave Chappelle, and I’m glad Chappelle was not hurt. By the same token, Chappelle’s joke after the attack yet again targeted trans people. It’s particularly noxious because Black trans people, especially Black trans women, experience far higher rates of discrimination, violence, etc. In his earlier special Chappelle essentially erased and elided Black trans people and their experiences, but then again, he clearly doesn’t see them or give a damn. He’s turned into a trollish creep.
marxist_homo
I am so tired of being lectured about Black trans women, as if they are some kind of social justice holy grail — the most marginalized of marginalized people. Sure, they’re people and deserve to be treated as such. But how about we start paying attention to the millions and millions of poor non-Black-trans-women around the world who are also struggling to survive? This obsession with Black trans women is absurd–and also, ironically, a little racist, insofar as it reveals just how much liberals fetishize Black trans women.
BoomerMyles
Chappelle’s lucky CA isn’t an open carry state.
humble charlie
I have never read a series of posts as full of hate and as accepting of violence as this one.
splunky
Sure Jan.
mailliw110
What are you, like 3 years old?
jt1990
Was it really a trans man that attacked Chapelle, or simply another black man? Not sure I’m getting the joke. But too bad the attacker wasn’t white. I hear CNN is desperate for “hate crimes” ever since Trump got banned from Twitter…
mailliw110
Well, here you are…so…
Cam
Wow,
The right wing, anti-LGBTQ troll account brought in FOUR screenames to try and attack anyone who points out Chapelle attacking the trans community.
Guess you got tried of trying to tell us all that Melania was brilliant and Ivanka has a conscience.
marxist_homo
Literally every time someone disagrees with you, you accuse them of being a right-wing troll who you “exposed” months ago. Do you really believe there is a single human being on this planet who cares enough about you to go to such lengths just to point out what an idiot you are?