At a party after his appearance at the Hollywood Bowl, where he was attacked Tuesday night by an assailant who carried a replica gun with a knife attached to it, comedian Dave Chappelle joked about the assailant getting what he felt he deserved.
Chappelle’s alleged assailant, Isaiah Lee, 23, jumped on stage, running toward Chappelle and barreling into him before security chased him off stage where they subdued him.
Chappelle joked at the party, “I felt good. My friends broke his arm. I felt good. How bad does a n***** have to be that Jon Stewart would stomp him?” as audio obtained by The Daily Mail revealed.
“Killing that n***** would have been stupid,” he added later.
At the time Lee attacked Chappelle, the comedian was thanking Chris Rock, Leslie Jones and Jon Stewart, who had appeared on stage with him. Chappelle’s joke about Stewart may have been apocryphal; it is unknown whether Stewart had a hand in subduing the attacker.
On Wednesday, Chappelle released a statement about the attack, saying:
Dave Chappelle celebrated four nights of comedy and music, setting record-breaking sales for a comedian at the Hollywood Bowl. This run ties Chappelle with Monty Python for the most headlined shows by any comedian at the Hollywood Bowl, reaching 70k fans of diverse backgrounds during the first Netflix Is A Joke: The Festival, and he refuses to allow last night’s incident to overshadow the magic of this historic moment.
The statement continued:
As unfortunate and unsettling as the incident was, Chappelle went on with the show. Jamie Foxx and Chris Rock helped calm the crowd with humor before Chappelle introduced the last and featured musical guests for the evening, hip-hop artists yasiin bey and Talib Kweli, a.k.a. Black Star, who performed music from their new album – the first in nearly 24 years – which was released on Luminary. Other special comedic guests last night included Earthquake, Leslie Jones, Jeff Ross, Sebastian, Jon Stewart and Michelle Wolf.
After the curtain call of his show at the Bowl, Chappelle said to Jamie Foxx, who joined him on stage, “Shout out to Jamie Foxx by the way,” The Daily Mail reported. “Whenever you’re in trouble, Jamie Foxx will show up in a sheriff’s hat.”
“I thought that was part of the show, I didn’t know what the f***,” Foxx replied.
“I grabbed the back of that n**** head. His hair was spongy. Absorbent,” Chappelle joked.
Foxx then saluted Chappelle: “Listen, I just want to say, this man is an absolute genius. We’ve got to make sure we protect him at all times. … For every comedian who comes out here, this means everything. You’re a genius. You’re a legend, I enjoyed myself thoroughly, and we’re not going to let nothing happen to you.”
“I’ve been doing this for 35 years,” Chappelle noted, then joked, “I just stomped a n**** backstage. I’ve always wanted to do that.”