Fail: Chocolate News & David Alan Grier
October 29, 2008
Written by The Genius
When I first heard that Comedy Central was going to start airing a show called “Chocolate News”, I got worried. All I could think about was “I just hope it’s responsible”, meaning I hope they don’t go all in and bet the farm on racial stereotype jokes the whole season (if it lasts that long, God forbid). My initial feelings seemed to contradict a belief of mine that I wrote about in a previous article on Afrothought.com about being angry and falling into the Angry Black Man stereotype. Basically, I feel people shouldn’t have to limit their expression and/or creativity for fear of self-fulfilling some kind of racial/ethnic stereotype. Although I still feel that way, there is a line drawn where self-expression and emoting becomes reckless and irresponsible.
Despite my initial reaction, I decided to tune into “Chocolate News” and see for myself what all the hype was about on TV and online. The show promised to be as edgy as Chapelle’s Show while retaining the same level of sophisticated humour and faux credibility of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Seeing as how these two shows were the both the funniest and my favorite shows on TV, I was somewhat excited to tune in and see if the once genius David Alan Grier managed to make comedy magic again.
What I saw was a bastardized version of Mind of Mencia on crack. Not only is Chocolate News not funny in the slightest, but it focuses on solely racial stereotypes and prays that the jokes turn over. I’m not against racial stereotypical jokes, but what made Chapelle’s Show so frikkin’ hilarious is that the racially motivated jokes were clever and took a completely different approach to the same issues as well as brought new ideas on screen as well. Furthermore, Chapelle’s Show did not bank solely on racial punchlines, there was actual substance there.
To make matters worse, Grier has been working on this show for years, battling back and forth with Comedy Central executives (who were hesitant in producing another Black show after Chapelle’s impromptu departure), to ensure the content of Chocolate News was responsible.
“Are you laughing with me because you get the joke, or am I giving you license to laugh at me in a derogatory, dehumanizing way?” says Grier [while considering content for the show].
And this is the best you can do? I guess this is the level of material Comedy Central approves from of black comedians or maybe Grier set his own bar low as all hell. This is quiet possibly one of the worse show’s I’ve seen in a long time. I wish I had two sets of hands so I can give this show four thumbs DOWN! I respect Dave Chapelle even more for leaving Comedy Central before the network turned his show into Chocolate News…or Mencia’s crap show. Fail.
just sad….
Yeah, I keep hoping that it will improve. As if maybe DAG is just putting these episodes out to make all of us react as you have, at which point he’ll pull the old “Now that only the ’soulful’ are watching, here’s the real Chocolate News…” switch and magically whip out a show that lives up to the hype they created. This is my lofty aspiration.
I kind of expected it to be what it is from the commercials though, since commercials have evolved to show the best parts of everything now (and thus ruin the product for anyone who can connect the dots). I’m still keeping hope alive though.
It’s the skits that seem to be terrible to me. I’ve seen portions of his mock interviews when he’s in the studio and that doesn’t seem too bad. But I must say when I got a bit the other day about him being some old school porn star, I was disgusted and did not laugh once for the entire skit.
For some reason, maybe the TV execs - who knows - I find that having a person of color with some intellect hosting a TV show seems to be lacking these days. I know, I know, Oprah has daytime locked, but other than that, who? I refuse to watch ANY TYRA. She’s just an embarrassment and BET gives the most one-sided news programs EVER!!!! Jeff Johnson on BET, however, isn’t that bad and I think his heart is in the right place. But it’s just sad, sad, sad when we don’t have many people of color speaking with some common sense on some important issues. But I’m with The Gentleman … I’m keeping hope alive, too!