Appearing on the Oprah Winfrey Show, comedian Dave Chappelle finally broke the silence. Dispelling all rumors to the contrary, Chappelle says he was not crazy or on drugs when he walked on out the production of his hit show last year. He says he was simply stressed out.
''I wasn't crazy but it is incredibly stressful,'' said Chappelle, 32, on Friday's show. ''I felt in a lot of instances I was deliberately being put through stress because when you're a guy who generates money, people have a vested interested in controlling you,'' Winfrey's show was Chappelle's first interview since he left the show.
He spent two weeks in South Africa and then returned home to Yellow Springs, Ohio. Chappelle also told Winfrey that dealing with the fame was not what caused the stress, but rather the pressure he felt every day on the set of the show. ''I would go to work on the show and I felt awful every day, that's not the way it was,'' he said. ''I felt like some kind of prostitute or something. If I feel so bad, why keep on showing up to this place? I'm going to Africa. The hardest thing to do is to be true to yourself, especially when everybody is watching.'' Comedy Central announced late last year that it would premier the shows that were taped before Chappelle's departure.
However, neither camp has made mention of a return of the popular weekly comedy series. Comedy Central said in a statement Friday that ''Dave is a comedic genius whose work we truly value, and the door is always open to him.'' Chappelle has being doing live stand-up around the country since his return from Africa.
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