Donnell Rawlings: From ‘Chappelle’s’ Show’ to Netflix
The Last Laugh
The Daily Beast
4.6 • 661 Ratings
🗓️ 28 February 2024
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Before Donnell Rawlings was a professional comedian, he was an amateur heckler. He would go to comedy clubs and yell back at the stage, sometimes getting even bigger laughs than the guy with the mic. So even with his Dave Chappelle-produced stand-up special ‘A New Day’ dropping on Netflix this week it’s perhaps no surprise that he recently came full circle, getting caught on camera heckling fellow comic Corey Holcomb at The Laugh Factory in L.A. for going after both him and his famous friend of more than 20 years. In this episode, Rawlings breaks down that viral incident and talks about the long and “humbling” road he took to finally get his own Netflix moment. He also reflects on making a huge mark on “Chappelle’s Show” with relatively little screen time, how he felt about Chappelle walking away from that show without telling him and why he has no time for anyone who might be offended by their comedy.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is The Last Laugh. I'm Matt Wilstein from The Daily Beast. |
| 0:09.0 | It's been almost 20 years since Chappelle's show aired its final episode, |
| 0:15.0 | and my guest on today's show is still probably best known for this iconic catchphrase. |
| 0:21.6 | Now that you got your check, do you plan on quitting your job driving this truck? |
| 0:24.6 | Truck driver. I ain't no truck driving? I'm a janitor. |
| 0:28.6 | That's right, baby. I just bought this truck straight cash. |
| 0:31.6 | And I got enough cigarettes and last me and my family for the rest of our lives. |
| 0:35.6 | I'm rich, viage. |
| 0:38.3 | But as Donnell Rawling says in our conversation, |
| 0:42.3 | he was already finding success as a comic and actor before Chappelle's show, |
| 0:47.3 | and has spent the past two decades trying to both emerge from Dave Chappelle's shadow |
| 0:52.3 | and stay extremely close to the man who has become |
| 0:55.3 | comedy's most divisive figure. That close relationship led directly to Donnell's latest stand-up |
| 1:01.9 | special, A New Day, which started streaming on Netflix this week and is part of the |
| 1:06.6 | Chappelle's Home Team series that also includes the special from comedian earthquake that premiered |
| 1:11.6 | two years ago. Donnell's new special has been in the works for quite a while now, and is actually |
| 1:17.9 | the third version he shot after Chappelle told him the first two weren't good enough. It was a humbling |
| 1:24.1 | experience that Donnell says only made him stronger. |
| 1:32.3 | We get into a lot in this episode, including stories about the early days of Chappelle's show and how he felt when Dave decided to abruptly walk away. |
| 1:36.6 | We also talked a bit about the controversies that have consumed his friend in recent years. |
| 1:42.4 | We began, however, by jumping right into an incident that happened |
| 1:45.6 | this past week at the Laugh Factory in L.A., when Donnell was caught on camera heckling fellow |
... |
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