David Chappelle's 8:46 is part sermon, part history lesson, part eulogy -- and a reminder of what Chappelle does best

BuzzFeed News

Chappelle's surprise special in reaction to George Floyd's death is incendiary and brilliant, says Tomi Obaro. "Certainly compared to his most recent specials, where he has toyed with disappointing anti-trans rhetoric and refused to seriously contend with the ways in which he has downplayed Black women’s claims of sexual assault, 8:46 is a relief and a return to form," says Obaro. "It is a heartening reminder of what Dave Chappelle does best: tell a great story. This story is one of unfathomable cruelty and injustice, but also resilience." Obaro says that when Chappelle drops to one knee to mark the 8 minutes and 46 seconds that Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on Floyd's neck, "there’s something about his anger in that moment that is so palpable. It is a clarifying anger. At its core, this is what people are taking to the streets to protest — this clear and undeniable breach of injustice. There is a weariness to his anger, too." Obaro adds: "Historically, Chappelle’s mode when talking about race and racism is one of ironic detachment. ('Have you ever had something happen to you that was so racist that you didn’t even get mad?' he joked in a special from 2000. 'You were just like, "Goddamn, that was racist!"') It’s obvious that he cares deeply, deeply about Black people and the sorry state of race relations in this country, but he is not Chris Rock, kinetic with theatrical outrage. In contrast, Chappelle tends to be subdued, dispositionally cool and observant. So to see Chappelle at the full height of his anger in this special is especially striking."

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• 8:46 isn't standup comedy -- it's as an an anguished history of violence: "Dave Chappelle was not funny during his first stage performance in 87 days, an impassioned, 27-minute set that spoke to the cultural reckoning triggered by the killing of George Floyd. But the comedian was in top form," says Lorraine Ali. 8:46, she says, "was Chappelle at his rawest, which is saying something for a stand-up who’s offended, pissed off and riled up just about every possible corridor of the entertainment and media world over a decades-long career that has included Chappelle’s Show, multiple Emmys and Grammys. But this was a different sort of raw, informed by the heat of moment, decades of injustice and Chappelle’s own need to do something, no matter how underproduced or off-the-cuff."
• Chappelle knows his words have weight because he's a celebrity: "In a way, it's silly to review 8:46," says Daniel Fienberg. "Were it not for the urgency of the moment, it's not a thing that would ever see the light of day. It's not a 'routine,' because there's nothing routine about it. And it's not likely to be a set that he's going to tweak and refine in the months to come, because what opportunity is he going to have to go on the road and do unannounced sets at comedy clubs? This, in its own strange way, Dave Chappelle's version of the horrible black-and-white video of white celebrities talking about their 'responsibility' in this precarious moment — only that video came across as uncomfortably embalmed and embarrassing, while this set is uncomfortable only in intentional ways. It's fascinating...It's fascinating in how it responds to our expectations of what a typical comedy special looks like. There's nobody roaming the theater with a camera to get different perspectives or angles. It's mostly a single, stable shot interrupted by disturbing images and video footage of Floyd, of Eric Garner, of Philando Castile. Even that staple of the standup concert film, the cutaways to audiences roaring with laughter, takes on a somber tone as those reactions come from people wearing masks, many emblazoned with a 'C' for "Courage." The editing is minimal, hence a five-day turnaround."
• 8:46 is is more of an eloquent volcano of social criticism than a typical set: "Can a comedy set win a Pulitzer?" asks Jordan Hoffman. "Dave Chappelle’s surprise Netflix special is called 8:46, for the unthinkable amount of time George Floyd was pinned by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. The show, which bypassed the streamer itself to go straight to YouTube, is atypical even for this unusual performer, and is more of an eloquent volcano of social criticism than a typical set. His storytelling and natural charisma make the monologue riveting, enraging, inspirational and, to those who still don’t understand what’s going on, informative."
• 8:46 is remarkable, both as a performance and as a text in its own right, because it shows Chappelle as a paternal figure: "The most extraordinary thing about 8:46 is recognizing how Chappelle himself has metamorphosed,' says Matthew Walker. "While he begins and ends the routine by dismissing the idea that celebrity reactions to Floyd's death and the ensuing protests are of any importance ('Nobody cares what Ja Rule thinks right now'), he seems to recognize at some level that, in his case anyway, there are millions of Americans who are interested in what he has to say. This is because, in the space of two decades, he has changed alongside his audience. He has become, absurdly perhaps but also fittingly, a paternal figure, offering a nation of people who still laugh at his jokes about R. Kelly and crack and black white supremacists something at once similar and vastly more important."
• 8:46 is easily Chappelle's best work of his Netflix era: "Chappelle’s looseness greatly helps in this case," says Garrett Martin. "He mentions that he normally wouldn’t release something this hastily put together, but the whole spur-of-the-moment feeling about this video—like he’s not performing stand-up but just pouring out his heart and mind about the fucked up world we live in—is a huge reason that it makes such an impact. Whatever my criticisms with his recent specials, Chappelle has always been a smart, perceptive comedian with an innate grasp on how to speak to an audience; he’s also capable of being deeply sensitive, and that sensitivity returns in this video after being rarely seen in his latest full-length specials."
• Chappelle took a page from other heavy comedy specials, like Hannah Gadsby’s Nanette, dropping humor altogether in favor of grappling with Floyd's death: "Throughout the performance, Chappelle allows his restless body language to convey his unease and disquietude, shifting alternately from sprawling on a stool to crouching, standing, or kneeling," says  Aja Romano. "He also peppers his monologue with unapologetically misogynistic language, directed toward conservatives like Candace Owens and other women who’ve criticized the morals of black men who became victims of police violence. Chappelle has never been diffident about courting criticism for his reactionary brand of comedy or his insensitive treatment of other marginalized communities. But 8:46 is a reminder that his unapologetic willingness to offend can also be a powerful invective when he punches up instead of down."
• Why was the "Don Lemon is a funny newscaster because he’s clearly gay" joke cut out of the special?: Shortly after the special was posted, an eagle-eyed Twitter user noticed a discrepancy between the closed captioning and the audio and video of the 8:46 performance. “Don Lemon is a funny newscaster because he’s clearly gay, but … he’s the anomaly," read the closed-captioning, which was later completely disabled. "He’s black and gay, but unlike my other black and gay friends, he’s got this weird self-righteousness …” As Craig Jenkins notes, what's different about 8:46 is that instead of punching down -- as Chappelle has been doing in his last few specials -- he's punching up. 8:46, he says, is "almost perfect" except for that anomaly. "What happened here? What changed in a week?" says Jenkins. "Is Chappelle just incapable of going 30 minutes onstage without proclaiming that he doesn’t get what makes queer folks tick but suddenly net-savvy enough to know to filter himself now? Or did he pull those lines because he’s beginning to see the light, because it undercuts his message about the chilling consistency of black pain and disenfranchisement across centuries to single out one subdivision of black man for ridicule? Whatever the case, Chappelle in middle age still mirrors his audience. We’re coming together, and fast nowadays; we still have a ways to go."