In his controversial Netflix special The Closer, Dave Chappelle brings up his friend and fellow comedian Kevin Hart, who lost his job hosting the 2019 Academy Awards due to resurfaced homophobic tweets. “Yo if my son comes home & try’s 2 play with my daughters doll house I’m going 2 break it over his head & say n my voice ‘stop that’s gay,'” he wrote in one from 2011, while in another from 2010, he said someone’s profile pic looks “like a gay bill board for AIDS.” In discussing the backlash to the tweets (of which there are many), Chappelle claimed that “clearly Kevin was joking” and that Hart’s only crime was “breaking an unwritten and unspoken rule of show business… you are never, ever allowed to upset the alphabet people,” his term for the LGBTQ community.
Hart was asked about Chappelle’s comments in an interview with the New York Times. “That’s my brother. My relationship with Dave is one that I value, respect, and appreciate,” he said. “In our profession, it’s a crab-in-a-barrel mentality. There’s this perception that there can only be one star or one funny guy, and we’re always pitted against each other. When you have that confidence and security to embrace another talent and stand by another talent, it says a lot about who you are. Chappelle’s operating at a different frequency, man, and I couldn’t be prouder of him.”
Hart also claimed that the “good dude” doesn’t “have a hateful bone in his body,” even though by declaring himself “team TERF,” as he does in the special, Chappelle sided with groups with anti-trans agendas. As for whether he sees any similarities between what he went and what’s happening to Chappelle now, Hart replied, “I was human. You can’t lose that. And that’s what happening today: We’re losing that in the attempt to say, ‘I’m right and you’re wrong and that’s it.’ I don’t understand how we ever evolve.”
You can read the interview here.
(Via the New York Times)
