[Chris] Uh, that's good.
No, no, no, I wasn't...
That's fine.
I just... The... the monitors. I'm used to seeing the...
the whatever, but you know.
- I do this shadow thing, see. - [Kevin] It's fucking great.
[Chris] I saw, uh, David...
One of those things I got mad at that I didn't think of.
Hey, man.
- I got a couple of tricks up my sleeve. - It's pretty fucking genius.
[Chris] Hey, man. Steal it. It's all yours.
I can't. I can't now.
It's a bla... It looks like I stole it now.
- It's a clear... - It's cheap. Don't cost nothin'!
[laughs] It's a... It's a clear steal. It's a...
[Chris] You got trucks. You got that shit.
All you got... All you got is this.
- I got the fucking... - [both laugh]
I'm spending all this fucking money, and all I need is a light!
Been lying to me all this goddamn time. Shit!
["Daytona 500" by Ghostface Killah playing]
♪ Say peace to cats Who rock mack knowledge, knowledgists ♪
♪ Street astrologists, light up the mic God, knowledge this ♪
♪ Fly joints that carried your points Corolla Motorola holder ♪
♪ Play it God, he pack over the shoulder ♪
♪ Chrome tanks, player like Yanks Check the franchise ♪
♪ Front on my guys My enterprise splash many lives ♪
♪ Repel all fakes like reflectors ♪
♪ He had sugar in his ear In his last crack career ♪
♪ We can can him, manhandle him ♪
♪ If you wanna run in his crib, oh Get ditto, skate like a limo ♪
[Kevin] How'd the conversation go?
- [Chris] I think you called me? - [Kevin] Yeah. I called you.
The conversation, of course, started with just me saying, "Chris,
what are you doing? You are gearing up to go out."
I think we both... We knew we were both gearing up.
We were both gearing up,
and I'm smart enough
to always check to see what Kevin's doing before I go on tour.
- My schedule. - 'Cause I'm not getting stomped by Kevin.
- It's just not happening. - [laughs]
So I give him that respect.
I go... You know, Jay-Z doesn't drop a re...
He checks with Drake before he drops a record.
- Yes, yes, he's been around longer, but... - [Kevin laughs]
He's just a realist, so I'm like, "Okay, I'm gearing to go out."
"What's Kevin doing?"
I said, "Why don't we do something together?"
- Yes. - "What do you think about doing New York?"
"Like, destroying New York?"
["Spicy" by Nas playing]
♪ Pricy ♪
♪ Hit it, boy ♪
♪ Boss shit ♪
♪ Your lordship ♪
♪ Niggas talkin' yachts And some more shit ♪
♪ I used to run the block Now I'm corporate ♪
♪ Hoppin' out, you know it's Son When the doors lift ♪
♪ Whole squad hide the burners ♪
♪ Mets hats in the sky Like Bobby Shmurda... ♪
This is a story about two separate journeys
that go on two different paths
but somehow align
and end up at the same intersection at the top.
♪ Stackin' it upward ♪
♪ G's stay icy, 'cause shit get spicy ♪
♪ She on demon time I get her a timepiece ♪
♪ Patek, niggas not lit, not like me ♪
♪ Can't get nothin' by me My mind is 2090 ♪
♪ Que lo que, everybody pricy ♪
♪ Yeah ♪
[Chris] This is my favorite building in the world.
- [Kevin] Hands down. - I seen Prince here. I seen Beasties here.
I seen Eddie Murphy here.
Damn, you saw Eddie here?
I seen Eddie here, like, four nights in a row.
[suspenseful music playing]
The names that have graced that stage comedically,
um, are very far, few and in between.
You know, that have sold out the Garden.
It's a stamp of "I've made it, I've arrived."
Like, that's... It's a big deal, man.
You know, the New York shows that we're about to do...
This week in New York is an event.
[woman] I can't recall
um, two other, like, great headliners together like that.
The only thing I can compare it with is, like, Bruce Springsteen
and Paul McCartney being onstage together.
[Kevin] We wanna say, within our culture specifically,
it's something that we need to remove, because we have this idea
that there can only be one.
When people get caught up on that idea that there can only be one,
well, shit gets weird, because this competitive thing happens
and, "I can't like or support," or, "You ain't..." "This is..."
It's... It's weird.
[Wanda Sykes] Chris is... He's pretty quiet, you know.
He's in his thoughts and...
Kevin? No.
[man] Hey, brother.
I think Kevin is more affable, more fun, uh, more whimsical.
Chris is more biting, more acerbic.
Dude, how the fuck am I supposed to get out of here if there's...
Do you understand I could walk down there very easily
and no one would look at me?
But if there's a camera crew behind me, someone will follow me all the way home
and kill me.
Do you understand what I'm trying to say?
[Dave Becky] Their energies just work together.
No one was trying to upstage each other.
[Kevin laughs]
Everyone says you can't co-headline. They could co-headline.
Chris, what's up, baby?
- [man] C Rock. - Hey, what's up? What's up? Ha ha!
What's this? Where's my name?
Uh, your name, right, uh, right there, man.
"Big Rock. Little Hart."
[man] Ooh, that's catchy.
I was just at your lawyer Trina's. Even she said you should open up for me.
- What? Did she really? - Yes, she did.
Chris, I'm too big to open up for you right now.
Come on. You ain't too big for nothin'.
[laughter]
Maybe ten years ago, that made sense, Chris,
but now you're the third biggest Chris and the second biggest Rock.
I love Tony.
- [man] Damn! - Somebody's been writing!
You should use them jokes when you open for me on tour.
[laughter]
[solemn music playing]
Congratulations.
- [Kevin] Thank you. - [waiter] It's a watermelon salad.
Why you bring the Black man a watermelon salad? [chuckles]
That's like... That's just the hackiest joke in the world,
but... but I couldn't leave it there.
It's good.
- I couldn't leave the... - The watermelon joke had to happen.
I couldn't just leave it there.
I think, for sure, us knowing where we are,
us knowing what we are,
and us knowing what... what this moment represents for us...
When you think Kings of Comedy, you know, you're looking at...
The reason why I say Kings of Comedy was so strong,
in my opinion, it changed the definition
of what a comedy show was.
Every one of 'em...
top of their game.
[Kevin] When you think about The Kings of Comedy,
you gotta think about how and why that was done.
It was, "We're gonna put on... We're gonna... We're gonna show that we can do this
and that we can all align ourselves
in a way where there's no competition."
I think what Chris and I wanted to do
was do our version of that.
[Cedric the Entertainer] We were probably the number-two highest-grossing live...
[D.L.] That's the first time I heard of Pollstar. And it was a white act.
Money or... Who was it?
[Cedric] Yeah, something like Eddie Money.
Some white act I never heard of.
Highest-grossing live touring acts and it didn't get no press.
[D.L.] Right.
So this was strictly our community supporting this, showing up.
So any time you can go to Chicago and sell out two United Centers
and... and then be forced to come back...
- [D.L.] Do it two more times. - Two more.
Like, within weeks, 'cause the audience was like, "Nah."
- Like, "We need this. Come on right back." - [D.L.] Right.
[audience cheering]
Everybody was collaborative.
If I had a joke that didn't work for me and I saw you doing it that night,
I would give it to you, you would give it to me.
It was this thing where we were working together,
and I think that unity... Like, what's that old African proverb?
"If you wanna go fast, go alone. If you wanna go far, go together."
And I think we embodied that principle,
where we just knew that what we were doing, um, was so synergistic
and would be beneficial to all of us,
and even to our audience on a larger scale.
It just felt like we were doing something important.
What's the reason me and Chris are doing what we're doing?
Why am I doing this with Chris?
Because you want to pretend like you're not arrogant.
[laughter]
Stop being a dickhead.
[Na'im] You wanna pretend like you're not arrogant
and... and show love to the people that came before you.
It's really about giving a true visual
of people that are really successful, that have won, winning together.
I now truly understand what The Kings of Comedy was. Right?
Me and Chris talked about that shit for an hour and some change the other night.
The Kings of Comedy really redefined touring.
They really... They really...
They... they made it an event,
and they made it such a spectacle
to which people felt the demand for stand-up comedy in large venues.
But the event of stand-up comedy, Kings of Comedy did this,
and that's only because they decided to go together.
And they could've kept doing it, but their egos fucked it up.
[man] Their friendship is real.
When Kev was coming up, he was in close proximity to my brother.
So Kev never wasted an opportunity to pick my brother's brain.
Every time they sat next to each other, it was, "Hey, how do you..."
You see that clip of Kobe and Michael running down the court?
Mike's leaning over, holding his shorts.
Kobe walks over and is whispering in his ear.
They asked Kobe, "What were you asking?"
He said, "I was asking him how does he do that turnaround jump so fast?"
Mike's like, "You've gotta put your foot outside their foot
so when you spin, they're still stuck."
The intricacies of it.
Kev never wastes the opportunity to get those little intricacies.
He never wasted it.
So then he adds that to that insane work ethic,
and he's Kobe.
I'm excited about this week,
not just because of the arena factor.
I'm just excited to hang out with you. That's it.
- I'm just... Camaraderie. - [Kevin] That's it.
The thing, uh, when you are a stand-up,
it's... it's a lonely gig.
[Kevin] Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
[Chris] You're not... You know, I'm friends with lots of...
- Like, the Chili Peppers are my friends. - [Kevin] Okay.
[Chris] There's four of 'em! You know what I mean?
Four have a great show, four have a bad show.
They share that thing.
When you're a stand-up, even though you might have people with you,
you have crew and everything,
you are out there by yourself,
and... yeah, it's... it's...
The evening is you, up or down.
Where this is like, "Oh, okay. I get to work with Kev."
♪ Wait, wake up, blessed up ♪
- ♪ Uh ♪ - ♪ Hopped out, dripped up ♪
- ♪ Uh ♪ - ♪ Paid dues, time's up ♪
♪ Body bag zipped up Rap God... ♪
Tonight's the first night,
and I get to get some rest, and rightfully so,
because tomorrow's day one. Jones Beach.
♪ This the life See, this the life I chose ♪
♪ 505 we slept inside the cold ♪
♪ Had to learn to cook without the stove ♪
♪ Only thing that kept us hot was flows ♪
♪ On my day was A1 honor roll... ♪
[Kevin] Jones Beach, day one, Rock, Hart. Get to touch the stage with my guy.
♪ My only goal is I'mma die a GOAT 'Cause this the fucking life ♪
♪ They offer pussy and power They offer Gucci and fame ♪
♪ They think I'm new to this money They think I'm new to this game ♪
♪ They wanna see us in whips They wanna see us in chains ♪
♪ Legacy, legacy, legacy ♪
♪ They tryna ruin the name ♪
♪ They offer pussy and power They offer Gucci and fame ♪
♪ Legacy, legacy, legacy ♪
♪ Make 'em remember the name ♪
[audience cheering]
Yo!
Uh, before I even start...
Before I even start,
let me... let me just say one thing.
I'm okay.
[laughter]
[woman] Being in New York, it's one of those make-or-break places.
This is his hottest audience too.
This is where he first got the most love when he started.
I started when I was, like, 18, 19.
I had some advantages.
I'm from New York, so I didn't have to travel
from another city to come to New York.
You know what I mean? So I just took a train from Brooklyn.
But once I got good, things moved really fast.
Chris was compared, years ago, to the young Eddie Murphy.
I am from Roosevelt, Long Island.
I grew up in an all Black neighborhood. I did.
Did you grow up in an all Black neighborhood?
A predominantly white neighborhood?
See, 'cause, like, we've pretty much taken over New York, the Blacks.
Think about it.
The whites are going, "Hey, that's not funny!"
[laughter]
And he was kind of spotted
at the same club where Eddie Murphy was spotted
and then managed.
Coming up next to the stage is a young performer, 21 years old.
He's from Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn.
The Nat Turner of comedy, Mr. Chris Rock!
So what's up?
[audience shouting]
[Jerry Seinfeld] This was a fully-formed comedic energy that he found.
It was in him. It's always been in him.
You know, finding that person inside of you that's the real you,
that connects with people that don't know you...
So I was in South Africa the other day.
[laughter]
Or was it Boston?
...and they instantly know you from that joke.
They go, "Oh, I get who this guy is."
"This guy's funny. This guy's got his own take,
his own attitude, his own angle."
Nobody else can find it for you.
I love the opening scene of There Will Be Blood.
It's when Daniel Day-Lewis is in that mine,
and he's just hitting that rock.
And then spitting on the stone and rubbing.
"Is there anything there? Is there any gold there?"
That, to me, is the greatest visual metaphor for being a comedian
that I've ever seen.
Some people are just fuckin' funnier than other people.
When I was coming up,
Roseanne Barr was funnier.
Sam Kinison was funnier.
Damon Wayans was funnier.
Dennis Miller was absolutely...
Jerry Seinfeld, absolutely funnier
than the other comedians.
My brother mastered the New York audience by not trying to play
to just one specific portion of the New York audience.
He's not a Black comic. He didn't do just Black rooms.
He's not a white comic. He didn't just do the Upper West Side, the rooms there.
He's a New York comic. He speaks to everybody.
[laughter]
My father, man. Everything is money to my father.
You break something in my house, you break that amount of money.
If I broke this microphone, my father, "Boy just broke $50."
"$50!"
I know I couldn't work white audiences then.
- I didn't know how to work... - Right. Yeah.
And I didn't... I knew how to work...
I had one move, and I thought he had one move.
And he didn't. He could go left, right. He could do it all. He could work...
These audiences laugh just as hard as the other ones.
[Bill Burr] I think a big mistake is blaming the crowd.
A race could take over a crowd.
Like, the crowd, even though it was mixed, it had a white vibe.
Or it had, like, you know...
Late night at, uh, the Comic Strip, the late one, that one, that was Latino.
That was Spanish Harlem back when it was Spanish Harlem.
It was Puerto Rican. It was that vibe.
I'm probably the best comic you'll see tonight.
'Cause I'm Black, which means I can say anything a white comic can say,
plus a whole array of Black shit they can't even touch.
He was ambidextrous. He could work anywhere.
Like, if you can swim in five feet of water,
you can swim in a thousand feet of water,
'cause the mechanism is all the same.
His first TV appearance, Joan Rivers Show.
Will you please welcome Chris Rock?
[fanfare playing]
[Chris] It wasn't just The Joan Rivers Show..
The very last Joan Rivers Show.
Joan Rivers had just been canceled.
Her husband had just shot himself in the head.
I went out there.
I did, like, my first joke or my second joke,
and I wasn't doing well, or at least wasn't doing well to me,
so I switched the order
and did my last line, like, third or something,
and it was just a cue to the band, so I'm just, like, out there, like...
It was, like, this thing...
And you came, and you gave, and I told you, "What's up? Are you deaf?"
[laughter and applause]
[band playing]
Thank you.
[band continues to play upbeat music]
[music stops]
[man] That was great.
[audience laughs]
[Joan Rivers] Well, come on over, then. Come on over!
[audience cheering]
[pensive music playing]
[Chris] I was, like, a weird kid. I had a Jheri curl.
I mean, put it this way. I had holes in my shoes.
You know what I mean? Like, I was, like, poor.
It kinda was depressing to see,
"Wow, he's on TV, but he still sleeps in the room next door,
so I guess TV's not what we thought it was."
We thought, "Where's the bag of money that comes with being on TV?"
"Where are the white girls? Where's the car?"
You know, "Let's get it. What are we doing?"
[pensive music playing]
I was, like, this kid that had a lot of promise and made...
Like, it wasn't, like, a done deal that I was gonna be anything.
Yeah.
But, uh, Eddie saw something in me that
I didn't even know.
You know, I wasn't even sure what it was. You know what I mean?
But he... he... Eddie saw it right away.
Everything I've become, Eddie Murphy told me I was gonna be
the first day I met him.
[chuckles] Like, straight up!
[interviewer] And what happened? Eddie Murphy saw you one night?
One night. Just... You know, I went to meet him.
Uh, the guy at the club, the owner, introduced me to him.
He says to me, "When are you going up?"
I was the last guy on the totem pole. I wasn't even going up that night.
I said, "I'm not up." He said, "Put him on next."
My brother's hanging out, hoping that somebody doesn't show up
so he can get on. He's not even on the lineup.
Eddie comes with the entourage and gloves with rings over the fingers,
which is the weirdest shit I ever saw,
and my brother begs the manager to put him up that night
because he wants Eddie to see his set.
Well, I had a good set, did real well. Knees shaking, real scared.
And Eddie sees him, sees this young, Black kid
that was on the same stage that he started,
and now Eddie has questions. "What are you doing?"
"Who are you working with? Are you working on anything? Are you going out?"
My brother says, "Not much. Just working, trying to get on."
And Eddie says, "I might have a role for you in a movie."
He was prepping Beverly Hills Cop II.
[woman] No. What happened is he comes running in the house
about two o'clock that morning, ran upstairs,
and woke me up, "Ma, I'm going to California."
I said, "No, you're not."
He said, "I'm going to California." I got very upset.
I said, "You can't go. Eddie Murphy might be on drugs or something."
"You can't go with people you don't know," and, "You don't have enough money."
And I really fussed.
He was grabbing clothes, running down to the laundry room, washing,
about two and three o'clock in the morning.
That was Sunday or Monday. Monday, you were supposed to leave.
And I just put my foot down. I said, "You're not going."
And I got dressed, and I went to the dentist,
'cause I just assumed that he wouldn't go.
His father got up, took him out, met Eddie,
put him on a plane, and sent him to LA.
I get $10 for cars. I get $20 for limos.
What the hell is this?
My truck.
[Kevin] Your Eddie story is you for me.
The first... The first real...
The first real comedic star
that I had a conversation with that was a star
was Chris Rock that...
- Really?! - Think about it.
At the Cellar. Shout out to all of our people that we know.
- Right, right. - Patrice, Vos, Norton.
Robinson, Burr, Colin Quinn.
It's weird how funny...
Every guy you just said is a killer!
They're some of the best comedians to ever touch the stage.
So when you popped your head into the Comedy Cellar,
when it happened, that was the big...
[Chris laughs]
The government don't give a fuck about you, man.
The reason coke and weed are illegal in America
ain't 'cause they bad for you.
The reason coke and weed are illegal in America
is 'cause the best coke and weed ain't made in America.
[audience cheering]
That was a big fuckin' deal, and for a while,
fly on the wall, I'm the guy in the back,
and I'm watching the conversations and, you know, just listening,
and eventually, it got to the point where, "Hey, man," I can introduce myself.
And, you know, you weren't a dick. "How you doing, man?" Keith Robinson...
You know what's funny though? The attitude you have no one has anymore.
- [Kevin] - Mm-mm. Mm-mm. - [laughs]
Like, I used to go up to Rodney... I'd be so humbly going up to Rodney Dangerfield
or humbly going up to... "How are you?"
These motherfuckers be like, "You don't know me, nigga?"
[Kevin] "Don't know me from my page?"
- "You don't know me from Instagram?" - [Kevin] Yeah, "From IG?"
- "You don't see all my..." - "Nigga?"
"We should do a tour together." I'm like, "Who are you, motherfucker?!"
[Kevin] I watched it.
I watched that motherfucker like a hawk.
I talked to him. I asked him questions.
Chris answered my questions.
He embraced me as a young comic,
and, for that, I will forever be grateful.
And, as I got better, he made me aware of it.
I think... I think it's a fuckin' slap in the face if you are a comic
and you do have the opportunity to watch a legend be a legend,
or you watch and you see what makes the legend the legend.
Wait, was I famous and you, like, had a regular job?
I was at City Sports. I was at City Sports.
- I was working at City Sports. - That is amazing.
Bigger & Blacker came at a time where I was working as a shoe salesman.
Your comedic rise, um, it was in my...
You're talking about me as a young adult.
You're talking about me 18, 19.
The option to do stand-up was brought up to me
by the people around me that thought I was funny.
I was shocked when they brought it up. It was like, "You should try comedy,"
and I was like, "Where?"
They gave me all this information.
Went to the amateur nights, watched comedy after work.
Like, "Kev, you should do it." They told me it was on a Thursday.
Told 'em I would. I said, "Give me a week. I'mma sign up."
Without any type of stand-up-comedy experience, knowledge,
I knew enough to know it should be one joke, then a joke, then a joke.
It should be an opener, some stuff in the middle,
and then what am I gonna get off on?
- [camera clicks] - [Kevin] Like, I had the beats.
Over the course of five, six days. I wrote up these jokes,
and on amateur night, I was hype.
I was hype.
My name is Keith Robinson.
I'm from Philadelphia.
South Philly.
People love pets more than they like human beings.
Remember they tried to make pit bulls friendly.
"Oh, pit bulls are friendly!" Pit bulls have never been friendly.
You never seen a commercial with a pit bull catching a Frisbee,
taking it back to a little boy.
Any dog that walk like this...
[laughter]
In, like, '98,
I would go to The Laff House
and see what young comics are doing their thing.
So I seen a guy named Kevin Hart.
But he called himself, at that time,
Lil' Kev the Bastard.
[chuckles] Little Kev the Bastard. Lil'. Lil' Kev the Bastard.
I'm like, "What? Lil' Kev the Bastard? What are you, a wrestler?"
A very funny man, let's give it up for Lil' Kev! Lil' Kev!
[cheering]
[hip-hop music playing]
- Cut it off, cut it off! Cut it off! - [music stops]
[laughter]
That is my song right there. I'm gonna get hype, ready to do my thing.
Put it on so I can get hype, so I can feel myself.
Have a great time. See, that's how you gotta...
[music playing]
Cut it off, cut it off! That's it. That's all I need.
That's all I need.
"First of all," I said, "Number one,
get rid of Lil' Kev the Bastard."
"I don't want that."
"What's your full name?"
"Kevin Hart," in a little squeaky voice.
"Kevin Hart."
He almost said, "Sir." [laughs]
"I want you to come to New York."
And the first place Kevin Hart came to was The Comic Strip,
and that was the start of Kev in New York.
The New York comedy scene is what actually made me a comic.
Right? Or, uh, a comedian.
Um, I was a guy doing stand-up, right?
I was performing, but I wasn't necessarily a comedian.
New York is what shaped and molded me
into the clear-cut definition of what that is.
New York, what I... what I think it gave me was speed.
New York has a... definitely has a faster pace than other cities,
any other city in America.
[Dave Chappelle] There were many nights,
where I would play as many as 13, 14 shows in a single night.
Twenty-minute sets, but still, 14 of 'em.
So if I came up with a new joke idea the second show,
I could do it 11 more times in a single night.
So our process of refinement in New York was quicker than, say, a comic in LA.
A comic in LA would say, "Hey, I saw you on Letterman."
New York comic would be working.
[suspenseful upbeat music playing]
[Kevin] When you're a comic, the energy that you get from New York City
is like nothing else.
You're at comedy clubs until 3:00 in the morning.
3:00, 4:00 in the morning, you're hanging out, standing outside,
eating pizza, talking to other comics,
and you're thinking about being funny, talking about being funny,
with funny people.
I know the crew I came up with,
Sandler and Colin Quinn and Jerry,
you know, made me tough.
And your New York crew is...
My God, Burr and Patrice and Louis.
I mean... brutal. Like...
- Brutal. - Your New York crew.
And I swear, man, I'm not no asshole. I... I... I...
[laughter]
I... I started crying, you know.
You know, I cried 'cause I... 'cause I...
'cause I couldn't give a fuck.
[laughter]
Patrice O'Neal fed off of your discomfort.
So you looking a certain way or making a face
at the audacity of the nerve for him to say the things that he said,
it fueled his comedic genius.
I remember when fuckin' Patrice threw a phone book at me
as I'm performing.
Out the corner of my eye, I see something in the fuckin' air.
What?
It's a phone book.
Dude, what the fuck?!
He said, "You're better off if you read that to the audience."
"Read the phone book to the audience."
That was 100% out of love.
It was 100%... It was us saying, "You're one of us."
That we know, despite where your mumbling act is at,
that you're gonna be one of us, and we like you.
- You guys threw phone books at me... - [Bill] I never did that.
Patrice did it. You were there.
Well, he's dead, so fuckin' talk to him about it.
All right, well, I can't, obviously.
This, by the way... RIP, Patrice, that's Bill.
That's not me.
- What, him? Fuck him! - Okay.
I've been doing a benefit for him for ten years.
He wouldn't have done fuckin' ten minutes for me.
You know he wouldn't!
"Is it all the way New York? I'm not driving through the fuckin' tunnel."
I still love him.
[laughs] See? You know.
There you go. There's some comedy. It's 'cause it's true.
"Hey, stupid."
That's what Keith would call me, "stupid."
"You work on your set, stupid?"
"Fix those last jokes. Your ending stinks."
"They don't know who you are."
"Talk about who you are, stupid."
It was always advice. It was always information.
They were always right.
With Keith, you know, that's a...
That's a Jedi.
Keith is an oracle.
He's one of those individuals that you go through in comedy
and so many people have heard of.
Ah, shit.
It took me about an hour and a half to get down here.
[laughter]
Nah, man, you see they built that just for me.
Well, I had a second... Just had a second stroke.
No, not just now, motherfuckers.
[laughter]
Keith would drive from Philadelphia to New York and back
every night.
Why? Because he was taking care of his mother in Philadelphia.
He was her caregiver.
And then still brought Kevin Hart up from Philadelphia,
mentored him, taught him the game, took him around.
So I told Kev, my first thing to Kev,
"Get yourself a tape."
"I wanna see a tape."
"With material on it."
Dave Attell, who's still a client, who's, like, the New York comedian...
Drinking and driving, a lot of people say it's wrong,
and I call these people the cops.
But you know what?
[laughter]
Sometimes you got no choice. Those kids gotta get to school.
Am I right?
And must've been in '99 or 2000, maybe 2000,
Dave Attell called me and told me about this kid Kevin Hart.
I'm like, "You never tell me about anyone."
There's a tape of him at Caroline's.
Like a homemade, from-the-back-of-the-room tape.
I remember putting it in and a couple of assistants and us watching it.
He was making himself vulnerable,
and I hadn't seen a lot of comedians doing that.
Just to get something off my chest before I even start.
Everything I say up here tonight is a joke, okay?
It is nothing else.
I don't want nobody taking none of this too serious.
I don't need nobody coming up to me after the show,
talking about, "Who's the funny one now?"
All that.
He was just hilarious. He was, like, 22 years old.
Look, did I know this was gonna happen? No.
["Helicopter" by Bloc Party playing]
[Rosalie] This is a homecoming for Chris.
You know, it's hot.
["Helicopter" continues]
[Tony] I told my agent when I saw they were in New York,
"Don't book anything that weekend."
I buy my ticket. I get my Airbnb.
I'm coming home. I haven't been home in a while.
♪ Empty ♪
♪ Running on... ♪
I was looking forward to coming home and eating pizza
and running around, seeing Puerto Rican girls, all that.
But I have to be at these shows.
♪ He'll die a liar ♪
♪ Some things will never be different ♪
My dad worked at the New York Daily News.
The hub of the New York Daily News
is the same ground that the Barclays Center sits on.
[somber music playing]
When the New York Daily News moved to New Jersey,
they tore that facility down and built the Barclays.
That's why it was so important. This was the ground Dad worked on.
[somber music continues]
[Chris] In 1988, my father died,
and, you know, a year and a half later, we lost our house.
Like, shit happens.
So, you know, like...
It's like, "Huh? What?"
You know what I mean? In '89, it was like, "Oh, there's a pink sticker on our house."
And my brother goes here... Like, the family separates.
And, you know, we're still reeling from that shit.
We act like my father died suddenly.
No. If you look at the statistics, he died right on time.
Until recently, you know, the average Black man dies in his fifties.
So, if you're the oldest, you're always...
Your whole life is... You're being groomed for your parents' death.
Your whole life. That's why they're so hard on you.
'Cause Black men, especially poor Black men,
die in their fifties.
Chris was the oldest sibling at the house at the time,
so a lot of responsibilities had to fall on him.
He had to help out with, uh, you know, light, gas, mortgage.
So he had to assume responsibilities I don't think he anticipated, you know?
[somber music continues]
He was the oldest. He was the kid that my dad poured everything into,
and he had to be a man the next day, and it was like a switch.
What's your father's job in life?
It's to interrupt you when you're getting ready to do something.
You know, you can sit in your house all day doing nothing.
The second you got something to do, that's when your father, "Hey."
"These dishes, huh?"
What about those other nine hours I was laying down?
He would be at the comedy club, and he would have spots,
or what he might do is, uh,
if he didn't have anything else booked for the night,
he might go in the car and take a nap or go and get something to eat.
During the time my dad passed,
I think the way he... he grieved with it was more so he just kept working.
We were coming to clubs
and the guys we thought were names that we saw on TV,
they're going up and my brother's behind 'em.
Famous people walk in, and they go up, and my brother goes up right behind 'em.
And the famous person knows my brother. It's like, "This is big."
Chris was ready to do, you know, bigger stages.
And then Chris went to Saturday Night Live.
Here's what happened.
In Living Color was the biggest thing on television.
Saturday Night Live had not had a Black cast member for nine years.
So... 'Cause, uh, Damon Wayans had been fired, like, nine years earlier.
So... And he was barely on the show,
so they kinda...
In the...
In the public's eye, Saturday Night Live hadn't had a Black cast member
since Eddie Murphy, really.
I got on Saturday Night Live kinda through... through affirmative action.
Do I get on SNL if there's no In Living Color?
Probably not.
[man] The Dark Side with Nat X.
[applause]
Peace, brothers and sisters.
I'm Nat X, and welcome to The Dark Side,
the only 15-minute show on TV.
Why only 15 minutes?
'Cause if the man gave me any more,
he would consider that welfare.
I didn't go to college.
I barely went to high school.
So SNL was the first school I actually embraced
and actually learned,
and I had great professors.
You know, Conan O'Brien was a writer on the show
when I was on the show.
Bob Odenkirk, the great Bob Odenkirk, Better Call Saul,
was a writer on the show who really took his time with me.
I had an office with me,
Adam Sandler, Chris Farley, and David Spade,
shared an office.
You know, Mike Myers was, like, around the corner.
You know, it was like I was in the X-Men school of comedy.
We had only watched SNL for Eddie Murphy.
Who's the Black guy that's on there now? My brother.
Saturday Night Live is not about stand-up comedy.
Doing sketch comedy or improv or acting
is the opposite of learning to become a comedian.
Learning to become a comedian is learning to be you.
I would love to see Batman fight crime
in my neighborhood.
[laughter]
Yeah.
He'd be like, "Robin."
"Yes, Batman."
"Didn't we park the car right here, man? I swear it was here a minute ago."
I opened for Chris Rock when I was in high school.
First time I met him.
He was playing in DC all that week, and I'd follow him around,
'cause, in those days, it was rare to see a Black headliner.
He was hot as a pistol 'cause he'd just done, uh, New Jack City.
Bam! Ps-ew! I'm out.
You want to do this correct or not, man? 17, man!
Yo, let me see the money. Whassup?
The greenroom at the Comedy Connection
was the first time I can remember he and I speaking to one another at length.
He was talking me through the decision of whether I should go to college.
[interviewer] How did that work out?
Well, I ended up not going to college. I did the right thing.
Sometimes it feels like nobody gives a damn,
nobody wants to give you any advice, and nobody is trying to help you,
but I know of Chris Rock helping out a few people, okay?
And doing some momentous, like, big things.
Like, okay, so Chris Rock looked out for Wanda Sykes, put her on, right?
And you see what's happened with her career. Huge.
Now, if I spend $400 for a gun,
I'm shooting somebody, you know what I'm talking about?
Flesh wound, pinky finger, somebody's getting shot.
I refuse to let a $400 gun go to waste.
Avon lady, ding-dong, boom!
[laughter and applause]
If you are confident in your craft,
when you see someone else who has potential,
you want them to be... You want them to be better.
I have asked my brother for five favors my entire life.
He said no to all five favors,
and I swore to the heavens above
that I would never ask him for another favor as long as I live.
And for 20 years, I didn't.
So I come home this weekend,
I go to the greenroom after the show.
It's a big to-do, and I'm just standing in the corner.
And I literally say to myself in that moment,
"I know you said you would never do it, but if you don't say anything right now,
this is the opportunity of a lifetime that you're gonna regret not speaking up."
"He's probably gonna say no 'cause that's what he does,
but at least you put it out there in front of all these people."
"So how are we doing this Monday?"
"'Cause it's the Barclays."
"Hey, Mommy lives across the street."
"What we doing Monday?"
Everybody's...
Chrissy's on the couch. We call Chris Chrissy.
Chris... Chrissy's sitting on the couch. He says, "We'll figure it out."
And I say, "All right, everybody, you heard it." "We'll figure it out."
"I'm out." I leave.
Sunday, I go to bed, I say my prayers, put it in the Most High's hands.
If it's gonna happen, it's gonna happen. I'm still gonna support.
It's the Barclays, Brooklyn, home.
And I'm in the car on my way to the Barclays,
and I get to the foot of the Manhattan Bridge,
about to come over the Manhattan Bridge into Brooklyn,
and my phone goes off, and I look, and it says, "You're on the show tonight."
And I fuckin' lose my mind.
[announcer] Brooklyn, give it up for my man, Tony Rock, y'all. Let me hear it!
Brooklyn, what up?
Y'all thought y'all wasn't gonna see me?!
I'm from here!
I told my brother, "I wish you would do a show in Brooklyn and not put me on."
"I'll come onstage and slap the shit outta you again."
[Chris] Tony's always been better at everything. [laughs]
Growing up, honestly... People...
I don't say that just to be, like, placating.
Tony's...
He's taller, and he's handsome,
and he's a great athlete, and he can fight,
and he can play basketball.
He's just, like, this cool guy.
It was great, just 'cause my mom was there
to watch Tony, to watch all of us.
And, I don't know, it just felt like the whole family was together.
For one night, the Rock boys were in the building,
It was a beautiful thing.
["Roc Boys (And The Winner Is...)" by Jay-Z playing]
[Kevin] Chris, come back up here. Get your ass back on this stage, man.
Make some fucking noise for my brother, man!
[cheering]
I'mma ask you again.
Make some fuckin' noise for my brother.
[cheering and applause]
[Kevin] Hey.
Chris Rock is not just a friend. He's not just a brother.
This is my mentor.
This is the reason why I stand where I stand today.
[cheering and applause]
It's so important to me to make sure my brother understands the impact he's had,
not on my comedy, but on the whole fuckin' entire world of comedy.
Coming to Brooklyn, I felt would be the best place
to show this nigga in real time what the fuck he means to stand-up comedy.
- I love you. - I love you, brother.
[Kevin] I mean it.
I mean it.
Talk to your people, man.
Brooklyn!
Bed-Stuy! Rock break!
♪ The Roc boys in the building tonight ♪
♪ Oh, what a feeling, I'm feeling life ♪
♪ You don't even Gotta bring your paper out ♪
♪ We the dope boys of the year Drinks is on the house ♪
- ♪ We in the house ♪ - ♪ The Roc boys in the building tonight ♪
♪ Look at how I'm chilling I'm killing this ice ♪
♪ You don't even Gotta bring your purses out... ♪
You know, seeing Chris's mom backstage was so dope.
Honestly, it's like... It's probably one of the few times where I'm jealous.
[music fades]
The biggest reward to your parents is just seeing their child
figure it out.
I wish my mom could've seen me figure it out,
but the idea of my mom being backstage would've been dope as fuck.
[man] A thousand percent, my brother get his drive from my mom.
Thousand percent.
Our household growing up, Mom... Mom basically did everything.
My dad's in and out of prison, you know.
My mom, she said, "Hey, you gonna do it, do your best."
That was my mom.
"If you're gonna do it..." "Let me do this shit right the first time
because this lady ain't gonna let me sleep until I get this done."
She was a beast, an absolute beast.
[Tiffany] Single Black moms have to be
some of the strongest people on this planet.
It is not easy to raise a child,
and it's definitely not easy to do it by yourself.
I don't care what color you are, it's hard, period.
But there's... It's a little bit harder for a Black woman.
I know a lot of Black women are tired of hearing this.
"Be strong. You gotta be strong. You're so strong."
No. Sometimes I need to be held.
It's not easy to be strong.
And I think people think like, you know, just 'cause you Black, you got it. Like...
Saturday and Sunday. June 13th.
This is Nancy Hart,
and we're taping this for Rob and Kev Hart.
Gonna be a Happy Father's Day.
So my mom ends up... She got ovarian cancer.
Lady's crazy. She don't tell us shit. She's been going to the doctor for a year,
and it's metastasized to a point where there's nothing they can do about it.
So by the time I find out, I'm like, "Nothing we can do."
So I go to the doctor, I find out everything
because I can't trust her to tell me the truth,
and I'm like, "So, any chance?" Like, "No. It's a wrap."
My mom would get mad, her blood pressure would rise, and she would just pass out.
You could tell she was gonna pass out 'cause her sentences stop making sense.
She would just be yelling.
"Uh, Kevin, uh, take your foot, uh, off the boy,
and, uh, put it in the pizza box before I smack..."
[mumbles]
[laughter]
[Robert] When he was doing New York
and I seen his transition from New York to LA,
it became, uh, "What's gonna break him?"
My mom knew.
She's like, "Don't tell him," 'cause at the time,
he was about to go to Australia to film Fool's Gold,
and so things was just starting to bubble.
And so my mom was like, "Listen. Promise me. Do not tell him."
I'm like, "Okay."
"When it's close to the end, that's when you let him know I'm dying."
I'm like... "All right."
[Kevin] I, of course, was extremely close with my mom.
So I think that there was information that they were trying to keep away from me,
but some things were obvious, right?
Like, it was becoming obvious that my mom's condition was
much worse than what was being presented.
I said, "Listen."
"Doctor's done told me this stuff. She probably got about two weeks."
"I can tell by the way her veins is."
"You need to get home now if you wanna see Mom again
because, you know, there might not be no other time to say goodbye."
He's like, "Wait, she's..." I'm like, "Yeah."
"You know, this is it, and I mean, like, she's gone."
He comes home and I'm explaining everything, and he's like, "Damn!"
And he's... As I'm telling him this,
he's telling me how Fool's Gold has opened up all these other doors,
and all these other things. I was just like, "That's crazy."
Like, on her way out, she could see
how, you know, this was something he needed to do.
"Be focused, do your best, not be all centered on what's happening with me."
And she was right. Dead right.
[gentle music playing]
[Kevin] You know, my mom...
My mom is definitely, uh...
She is responsible for giving me the ability
to... to... to understand the benefit of hard work,
to understand
what saying you're going to do something and actually doing it truly means.
You know, that work ethic is all attached to my mom.
I remember when my sitcom got picked up, The Big House...
[upbeat theme music playing]
♪ Home, sweet home ♪
♪ Yeah ♪
And the upfronts...
The upfronts is where they basically announce all the network's new shows.
It was happening in New York.
They flew me out. I'm hype. I fly the rest of the cast out.
This is big. My life is about to change. "Oh my God."
"Here it comes."
"Success. Here we go."
Things were happening for me as a comedian. I was gaining some steam.
And, uh, when we go to, like, the upfront event,
right before it's time for me to go out, put a hand on my chest,
"Sorry, Mr. Hart. The network is not gonna pick up your show."
That fast, it was over.
Your life can't possibly be worse than mine. Look at me.
I'm all smiles. You wanna know why?
Because your antidepressants are working?
No. It's because there's always a glimmer of hope, you know?
You've just gotta find it.
I went back to the hotel, changed. I went out that night.
I went to all the parties. You'd have thought that my show got picked up.
Everybody kept rubbing my back.
[exhales]
Taking deep breaths in my face.
[groans]
"I heard what happened."
[sighs]
Life.
[Dave Becky] He left with stronger relationships
with all the networks and all the studios 'cause they were at these parties.
It's fuckin' crazy.
[Chris] I have a saying, Kevin.
- [Kevin] What is that? - Always eat before a meeting.
- [Kevin] Why? - Because hungry people say dumb shit.
[both laugh]
So, you know, even before a lunch meeting, a meeting where you're supposed to eat,
eat something!
- Eat a piece of bread. - [Chris] Eat a piece of bread!
To stop you from saying some dumb shit.
"I ain't gonna do the deal 'cause you motherfuckers don't..."
[Chris] "Fuck you and NBC!"
"I don't need no network anyway!"
"I'll show this shit... I'll sell this TV show out of my trunk!"
[Kevin laughs]
"You think I give a fuck about y'all? Huh?"
- "Think I give a fuck about this studio?" - "Fuck you! You fucking crackers!"
Then leave.
"I didn't mean to call the head of NBC a cracker."
- "I was just hungry!" - "I was hungry."
"I ain't eat all day. If I'd have ate..."
I wouldn't have called the head of NBC a cracker.
But I hadn't eaten. So now...
if you learn nothing today...
- [Kevin] Uh... - Okay, let me get that veal chop.
- [Tony] What happened to my brother... - Medium.
[Tony] The backstory people don't know, he can't get his skits on.
He would write funny shit, pitch it to the brothers,
we would say, "Man, that's going. That gotta go."
Saturday night, "They cut my skit."
Rehearsal, "They cut my skit."
So he kinda was trying to find his bearings on SNL.
He never turned out to be the Eddie Murphy we thought he was gonna be.
[Wanda] It was significant that... that Chris landed SNL,
but the way they used him, or I should say didn't use him,
it was pretty, um, hard to watch.
So then he gets offered In Living Color.
The Wayans had left. They wanted to keep the show afloat.
"Let's get Chris Rock."
His agent and his management told him not to do it. He did it.
So In Living Color is this hot, hot, hot, like, white-hot show.
♪ Uh, your bad self ♪
♪ Help us break this down From off the shelf ♪
That's where the culture was going. A lot of times, I would leave SNL,
and instead of going to the wrap party at the end,
I would go to Latin Quarter
and hang out with Kid 'n Play and Queen Latifah
and, you know, and that crew
and Eric B., and, you know,
and Jam Master Jay and, you know.
Those were kind of my peers also.
They were, you know... I was hanging around with some Black people. [chuckles]
But not just some Black people, some creative Black people.
So that... I knew the culture was going that way,
and I wanted to be...
I just wanted to be where the shit was hot.
How much for... How much for some ice cream?
Some ice cream? You really want ice cream? I find ice cream for you.
How about I put a .44 slug in your head?
[laughter]
Why don't you make that a .22 and a flesh wound?
Get out of here! Get out of here!
I think he did one episode, maybe two. Maybe two.
In Living Color's done.
Management leaves, agency leaves.
He's literally out of the business.
In a weird way, my career was kinda over in a sense.
I got no TV show,
and I'm just a comedian.
You know, I didn't know at the time,
it's more... it's more powerful than all of that shit.
[laughs]
I remember him hanging around the clubs and coming back to it,
and really going, "Okay, let me find out what I have that's special."
The way he approached his career, uh, post Saturday Night Live
was like watching a Rocky movie in real life.
At this time, he wasn't the killer comic that we know him as today.
He was just trying to find his way on stage.
Our dad's gone, so that's a motivation.
...all the time. If Mick Jagger drove a cab...
Got all these siblings, that's a motivation.
Mom's like, "You're the oldest, the man of the house."
So back to the wall, fuck it.
Go to the pen.
[audience applauding]
And that's when Big Ass Jokes comes.
Black people, we don't even have... We don't even have salad dressing.
We don't have sal... Everybody got salad dressing.
No Black salad dressing. You know what Black salad dressing is?
Hot sauce!
[laughter and applause]
Dude, Big Ass Jokes, he fucking murders. Murders.
The second he says good night, the whole crowd... [imitates roar]
I was like, "Wow."
[Chris] I... I started really admiring the professional comedians.
I was like, "I wanna be a professional comedian."
There was something about, like, if you made it as a comedian,
you immediately made a name for yourself.
You weren't like, "Oh, this is the guy that plays whoever on this sitcom."
It was like, "You're Chris Rock."
[crowd cheering]
The most valuable thing you have as a comic
is your reputation as a live performer.
[Kevin] Mm. Mm-hmm.
If you have the reputation of throwing the fuck down,
you can have a flop movie, you can have a flop TV show,
you can do whatever, nobody cares.
If... Peop... You could go years without a hit,
but if people know you throw down, you will sell out every time.
- Okay? - That's, uh... That's big.
- It's real, and it's big. - [Chris] It's real.
Bruce Springsteen ain't have a hit record in 30 years.
Sells out every fuckin' show he does.
And them fuckin' tickets go fast.
When that motherfucker dropped Bring the Pain,
everyone had to shut the fuck up.
Shit, I was watching on HBO, had this special on.
The jail special.
Couple of months ago.
Normally, when you see a special about jail,
it's on regular TV, and there's a lot of shit they don't show.
Oh, not the HBO jail special. Oh, they showed it all.
They was interviewing a brother. They said, "Sir, when a new inmate comes in
and he wants some drugs, how do you initiate it?"
The guy goes, "Well, the first thing I do is make 'em toss my salad."
He was the first guy I ever heard write jokes like a song,
with hooks and everything.
"I ain't saying he did it, but I understand."
When that shit hit the streets, I'd hear people saying his bars on the streets
like he was Drake.
[man] Bring the Pain, Chris Rock.
[applause]
[Chris] Thank you. Wow!
I... I just wanna thank, uh, anybody who voted for me
that, uh, recognizes, uh, stand-up comedy as a real art.
[Dave Chappelle] Chris reestablished a standard of excellence
that was missing in comedy.
Bring the Pain changed my life
really fast.
It's hard to even quantify.
I believe that Grown Little Man and Shaq's All Star,
I feel like that came out in the same year.
So you have Comedy Central put up his hour, Kevin.
His hour, it was amazing.
- Yeah! Stop! - [audience cheers]
Stop!
Shaq's thing was an urban-audience Showtime,
and he killed it.
Hey, look, first of all, only time I ate your ass was on your birthday.
No. No. No, no!
[Chris] You know, art... art is subjective.
Comedy is subjective.
Killing on stage is not subjective.
[Tiffany] I remember when Kevin was doing the Irresponsible tour.
That tour was the highest-grossing tour in the history of stand-up comedy tours.
That we know about, legally.
[Kevin] I'm at Madison Square Garden where history is always made.
There are 19,000 people in attendance tonight.
♪ Step up, step, step up, step up ♪
♪ Step, step, step, step, step up ♪
♪ Step, step, step up Step, step, step up ♪
♪ Step, step ♪
♪ Once you step in the arena, cheater ♪
♪ You're gonna be amazed when you gaze At the armor on this leader ♪
♪ Fully clad and glad to fight a cause I won't pause ♪
♪ Fear is a joke, slowpoke I'm like claws... ♪
Man, you know, um, there's nothing better than seeing a plan come together.
So what started off as an idea and words quickly becomes, like, real.
♪ As I'm pulling out my lance ♪
♪ To kill you and advance To the winner's throne ♪
♪ 'Cause I own you Once you step in the arena ♪
♪ My... my... my... my arena ♪
- All these New York dates, Eddie did that. - [Kevin] Mm-hmm.
Eddie played the Garden for, like, whatever, five nights,
and then played the whatever the Jersey Meadowlands was.
Then went out to the Nassau Coliseum, and like...
Were you... Were you just a... Were you just a fan in the stands...
- [Chris] No, I was... - ...with Eddie, or were you backstage?
- I was backstage. - [Kevin] Wow.
I was like... I was like... I was like the kid in Bronx Tale.
[Kevin] Wow.
Like, I got to hang around with gangsters. I wasn't a gangster yet.
- But I got to be around the gangsters. - Keenen.
- Keenen, Robert. - Eddie, Charlie.
- Oh. - You know what I mean? Charlie.
Like, I was there. Rick James.
Call my wife. She called me twice. Here we go.
- Your wife? - Here we go.
- You know? - Which wife, Kevin?
- No. I have one wife. - [Chris] Current?
Don't listen to that, okay? Cut that out.
Hey, beautiful. How are you?
I'm fine. How you doing?
I'm okay. Thanks for taking care of this guy.
He ate some watermelon, called everybody crackers. We're done.
- We're finished. - [Eniko] What you say?
He ate watermelon, called all the white people crackers. We're done.
It's over for us.
We're both in the middle of our tours.
Right? Chris is doing his tour. I'm doing my tour.
It's not about outdoing the other. That's not what it's about.
It's a show that we can... we can all coexist together.
Um, you wanna go to Cellar?
You wanna, depending on who's there, we hang out or we just go up? Your call.
- We gotta go up. - Yeah, we can go up.
- [Chris] Yeah, yeah. - [Kevin] Okay.
[intriguing music playing]
[Kevin] The most exciting thing about comedy in New York, it's all night.
You know, you're truly a... a vampire looking for laughter.
There's truly nothing like New York comedy.
From the amount of comedy clubs,
from the energy of the city
to the melting pot of people.
I mean, some of everything is in New York.
It's as universal as you can possibly get.
- Told me ten fucking... You said 10:15. - Nigga.
[Kevin] 10:15. This nigga's dead. You're dead.
Estee and Manny. Rest in peace, Manny.
Manny, uh, and Estee ran the Comedy Cellar
and, you know, that place, I'm telling you, it was like Cheers.
It was where everybody came, every comic came.
There was just a high level of camaraderie
that was built at the back tables at the Comedy Cellar.
And before I was a comedian,
I remember hanging out at those back tables.
[Estee] I meet the comic,
I watch them do the set.
I still like to laugh,
so if I laugh, it's a good thing.
But then, beyond that,
I talk...
Let's say I talk to somebody,
and I find out that there's this whole story behind.
What motivates that person,
what they do, what they are about.
And I find that the comedians, especially comedians,
um, have the most incredible background stories.
[man] Y'all ready for more show? Come on, man.
[audience cheering]
We got a... We got a young comic who just started comedy
and he just wanted to do a little five minutes.
We like to give these young comics some love, man.
Y'all ready to give this young comic some love?
[cheering]
Make some noise for Kevin Hart, everybody. Kevin Hart.
[cheering]
The question is, when he first said Kevin Hart,
who the fuck did y'all think he was talking about?
[laughter]
Okay. Yeah, all right.
Y'all thought there was two?
Jesus! Uh...
Thank you. That was a little fucked up, right? Like...
They hesitated...
I ask myself all the time, "Why am I not crazy?
I feel like I'm supposed to.
I feel like I'm supposed to be crazy.
All the shit that I've been through. On paper, I'm supposed to be crazy.
Who knows? Maybe it's coming.
Maybe I got a hot batch of crazy waiting on me.
[laughter]
'Cause you don't see it coming. It just happens.
Nobody plans for crazy.
It just fuckin' happens.
Look at Will Smith. He didn't plan that shit.
[laughter]
It just happened.
It just fuckin' happened.
[cheering]
"Keep my wife's name out of your..." He didn't plan that.
[laughter]
It's a fuckin' outburst.
[cheering, whooping]
You guys got a night full of comedy, man, and it's not just about me.
It's about the other fuckin' amazing comics that are on this stage,
and I love to support the energy here.
Hopefully I've amplified it because, uh, the next versions of myself
and the next versions of fuckin' comedy superstars,
they gotta come through here. They have to.
So do me a favor. Show them the same love you showed me.
[cheering]
All right. I'll see you tomorrow. See you tomorrow.
- All right, go. - [Chris] Whoo!
[Kevin] Wait. What you doing? How you getting home?
[Chris] What? What? What now?
- I'm going home. - [Kevin] You gonna walk, right?
I'm... I'm... I got... I got a limo.
- I got a Bentley. - [Kevin] Hey, Terry!
He wanna fuck up the week, let him walk! Let him walk!
Come on, let's go. Stubborn.
He's the most stubborn person I know.
- ♪ Now we ready ♪ - ♪ Rolls-Royce pull up ♪
♪ Black boy hop out ♪
♪ Shout out to my mother And my father didn't pull out ♪
♪ MSG sellout Fuck these niggas yap 'bout ♪
♪ Whips on my whips My ancestors got they backs out ♪
♪ Too far? Five hundred stacks for the hood ♪
♪ Call me lumberjack 'Cause I wish a nigga would race ♪
♪ Do it like I? This the "wish-a-nigga-could" face ♪
♪ They ain't getting paper Like they should, wait ♪
[Chris] Okay, I guess we're good sound-wise.
It seems a little whatever, but hey, it's Madison Square Garden.
- It's not... - It sounds fucking great.
Look at my dumb ass.
[Chris] I've seen Kevin in here
three or four times now.
- [Kevin] Yeah. - I saw him do the fire.
- That's the first time I was like... - Let Me Explain.
"Let me see what this motherfucker got."
...my show, you're gonna see a bunch of pointless fire.
You're laughing. I'm not playing. I'm dead serious.
You think it's a game?
I saw the fire, I was like, "Goddamn, this fuckin' fire."
- Get fire on these bitches. - I was like, "God dammit."
New York's the mecca. New York's, you know...
It doesn't get bigger.
New York... New York City is not only a melting pot of anything and everyone,
it can truly define an entertainer
in ways that no other place can.
When it boils down to you getting on the mic
in front of people, live people...
- Gotta have something to talk about. - You gotta have some substance.
They need to know who Na'im is, who's Spank, who's Joey,
when telling a joke.
You have to leave a piece of yourself when you leave the stage.
These are the nuances of comedy and the business of comedy
and the nuance of telling... telling jokes.
But the work is the work.
[Kevin] What up, guys? How you doing?
- [Chris] Hey, man. - How you doing, man?
I just came to stop in, check on you before we start. What up, champ?
- What's up? - [Kevin] Don't want much.
Y'all at it right now?
Chris, I'm so... I'm so, uh, blown away
by what I'm discovering that is your process.
- My process. - This is all your shit?
Well, this here would be, uh, bullet points for tonight.
Every... every card represents a joke or a reference
that I choose I don't wanna forget.
You know what I mean? Like, you can remember all your jokes,
but some nights, I'm like,
"Eh, I'm not gonna close with this one. I'm gonna close with that one."
You have it down to a science where you can bullet-point the time.
You can, and by the way, sometimes something happens in the news.
- You got jokes on the bench. - I have jokes on the bench.
I'm going to tell you, I'm not only impressed by that,
but I'm disappointed in myself, because, uh, whatever I got got to fly.
[Kevin] By the time we get to the Garden,
it's gonna be a well-oiled machine.
Everything happens in rhythm.
Me and Chris said, "Let's put this rhythm together."
We gotta make sure that our rhythm is there.
There were no rehearsals. There was no warm-up sets that happened
that we were able to figure it out and see if this was going to work.
No. Chris had to show up with his hour. I showed up with my hour.
["All the Critics Love U in New York" by Prince playing]
♪ You can dance if you want to ♪
♪ All the critics love you in New York ♪
♪ You don't have to keep the beat They'll still think it's neat ♪
♪ In New York ♪
♪ All the critics love you in New York ♪
♪ New York ♪
- [Kevin] Look at you! - [Jay-Z] Look at you!
- [man] What's up? - What's up?
- Hi! - [Jay-Z] Don't be like that.
- No, no, no! Hey! - [man] What's going on?
How you doing?
- Well! - Well!
Well, you made it. I'm here. [chuckles]
- Yo, look at my guy. What's up? - [Jay Brown] How are you?
Good to see you. Look at you!
Look at your boy. Look at your boy!
Listen to me. Feed you some... Feed you some tidbits.
All right? Let y'all niggas know what the fuck is happening tonight.
They don't know, but I got a goat here.
I fuckin' had the city allow me to get a goat. I had to get the mayor to fuckin'...
Dave, Chris'll come out at the end. Gonna think that the show's over.
Say, "I got a gift," 'cause I gotta give Chris his flowers, man.
This is my guy, mentor.
"I got you a gift."
Tell the fuckin' guy to bring it, and we get the goat onstage,
and say, "a goat for a GOAT."
Me and Chappelle gonna take a step back,
and let our guy have his fuckin'...
[Jay-Z] Whoo!
- Let our fucking guy... - That's beautiful.
- We're gonna let him... - That's beautiful, man.
- Fuckin'... - That's fuckin' beautiful.
All you've been through, you're gonna get your fucking flowers.
- You're gonna get your flowers. - I got chill bumps.
- He has no idea. - That's beautiful.
- He has no idea. - Amazing.
He's just like, "All right, like, Kev's been great. It's cool."
Has no idea.
When I call Chris a GOAT,
I'm calling him a GOAT because of what he's achieved.
I'm calling him a GOAT because of his ability to stay current,
to still be doing what he does at a high level
and having a good time.
There's so many reasons.
To overcome obstacles and still be who you are,
to still have a sense of self.
Like, there's so many reasons behind my... my definition of GOAT for him.
But it has nothing to do with us calling Dave a GOAT.
- We feel like Dave's a GOAT. - Dave's a GOAT.
- Eddie's a GOAT. - There's so many tiers.
Lots of champs. Sugar Ray's a champ.
- Ali's a champ. Mike Tyson's a champ. - All champs.
So me and Chris doing the Garden,
and our hopes was that Dave shows up.
Even when we were, like, making the order and all that,
we knew it was like, "Okay, let's save some time in case Dave shows up."
[Kevin] We just waited.
[both laugh]
[Kevin] We got closer to the time, the week of, we got the call.
"I'm coming, man."
["Fallin Up" by Dr. Dre, Thurz & Cocoa Sarai playing]
[Chris] The camaraderie between me, Kevin and Dave,
we mutually respect each other, which is a beautiful thing.
Uh, we have three totally different styles.
Nobody feels threatened by the other.
Let's understand what the fuck is about to happen.
Am I the only one all souped up on Mountain Dew?!
- [Chris laughs] - I'm all souped up, man!
I'm about to jump on you like a spider monkey!
♪ Yeah, what goes up Eventually comes down ♪
♪ Let the dollars levitate as the world goes round from the ground ♪
- ♪ Keep fallin' up ♪ - ♪ Fallin' up ♪
♪ As I fall up on this ceiling so hot ♪
♪ Can't feel it Unless I put my hand on it ♪
♪ Like the killer did my money ♪
- ♪ Keep fallin' up ♪ - ♪ Fallin' up ♪
- ♪ Keep fallin' up ♪ - ♪ Fallin'... ♪
[Chris] We wanted to do the whole thing with Dave.
And, you know, Dave's... Dave's Dave.
Who... Who knows what Dave had to do that week, right?
[Kevin] Dave is a real rock star.
Dave marches to the beat of his own drummer.
Dave, uh, does what he wants when he wants.
And only Dave can navigate the way that Dave does.
Without getting into the process,
here's the... the ultimate deciding factor,
is that they asked me to.
And once I understood this was important to them,
I got on a plane, and I got my act together,
and I met 'em with what I had.
Whatever I had, I would've showed up, 'cause those are my dudes.
Dave, real quick.
Dear Heavenly Father, I thank you for bringing me and my brothers together
for the first time in this particular space
with something of this magnitude.
I ask that you bless us all with the ability to make people laugh,
and more importantly, have fun, love, support.
This is history, and we thank you for allowing us the opportunity to do so.
In your name we pray. Amen.
- Amen. - Let's go.
- Let's get it, man. Let's get it. - [woman] Kill it, y'all.
Let's get it, guys.
We realized we have an opportunity to make the most of a moment.
A moment that'll live forever.
♪ This is what you get... ♪
[crowd cheering]
♪ This is what you get ♪
♪ When you mess with us ♪
♪ Karma police ♪
♪ I've given all I can... ♪
Good to see everybody.
Dave came out. He had his moment. People went crazy.
But then did you see Chris's walk-up after that?
♪ Yeah, yo, yo ♪
♪ One, two, y'all, you know I rock ya Step in the rounds... ♪
Like, he had so much confidence, so much ego when he came out.
It was like, "Yo, I don't care what just happened. I am who I am."
Same shit when Kev came on.
"That was cute, what they did, but I'm still Kevin Hart."
My little dummy,
at Madison Square, following Chappelle, Chris...
Unbelievable.
[hip-hop music playing]
[Keith] Kev closing the show,
like, "Oh my goodness."
I was worried about him at first.
I'm like, "Come on, little dummy, you'd better be good.
Kev like, "Bop!"
And looked like Reggie Jackson out on the ballpark.
Madison fuckin' Square Garden!
Chris, bring your ass out here, man.
Get your ass out here, baby!
[crowd cheering]
Get your ass out here!
Yes, sir! Yes, sir!
Yes, sir!
Yes, sir, Dave!
Yes, sir!
Hey.
Dave, I got a gift, though.
- I got a gift for Chris and... - Oh, no, no, no.
No. I got it, and I'm gonna give it to you now.
- It has to happen. - I got watches.
No, no, I got a fuckin' gift. You shut your mouth and take it.
- Bring it up here, guys. Bring it up here. - [Dave] Wow.
[Kevin] Bring it up here.
Thank you.
- [Chris laughs] - Put it down, please.
Wow.
[Kevin] Set her down.
Let's go.
I got you a fuckin' goat.
- [Dave] This goat has... - [Kevin] You know why?
- [Dave]...been chauffeured. - Fuck you and your joke gifts.
- This ain't a joke gift. - I'm not Nick Cannon, motherfucker!
No. Fuck you.
Nigga, this is a goat for a fucking GOAT.
Hold your goddamn goat.
Get in the middle.
You take your moment to realize you're great and I love you.
- And without you... - By the way...
...it don't happen.
...this is the worst night of this goat's life.
- [laughter] - [Dave] Yeah.
The goat is just happy he's not in a Jamaican restaurant right now.
[laughter]
Come here. Come here.
- Juan. - [yelps] The goat's shitting!
[Chris yells]
The goat's shitting!
- [Kevin] The goat is shitting! - [Dave] Kevin fed the goat Indian food.
[laughter]
- The goat... - This goat's shit all over the stage.
Kevin, this was a terrible idea, nigga.
He told me he was gonna do this. "I'm gonna bring Chris a real goat."
I said, "That's a great idea."
- Look at this thing. - You keep your shitting goat.
Bring this goat.
If Chris didn't have on fucking white boots...
First day of show business, huh? Shitting on the stage, huh?
- What's up? - [Kevin] Dave.
What are you gonna name this goat, Chris?
Come here. The name is Will Smith. Come here, Dave.
[laughter]
What? What did I say? What?
When it's time to go to the Hall of Fame, I'll go.
But right now, I'm still playing. Right now, I'm...
You know, I got 25, I got eight rebounds, and I had six assists last night.
You can't be in the Hall of Fame and play at the same time.
I'm still playing.
I'm still good.
[Dave] Make some noise.
[jaunty music playing]
Chris Rock.
- Kevin Hart. - [Kevin] We're out.
I'm Dave Chappelle.
Thank you very much,
and good night.
♪ Hey, microphone testing ♪
♪ Testing, you playin' politician You Martin Sheen on The West Wing ♪
♪ Guessing the best thing For me to do is spit it ♪
♪ This shit is never a gimmick You listen more than a minute ♪
♪ I've been spittin flows Since the kid was six years old ♪
♪ And if you listen close I do this like some mismatched clothes ♪
♪ It's whatever, put it together You never could be this clever ♪
♪ I'm rockin' the mic forever You gonna stop me never ♪
♪ I'm cocky because I love it You Rocky without the punches ♪
♪ Hockey without the ice And boxes without the lunches ♪
♪ Flowin' like me, no one And that got you mad, bitch ♪
♪ Saw your boys are nothin' But just average ♪
♪ I ain't telling nobody How they should live their life ♪
♪ I got my own shit to deal with So that just isn't right ♪
♪ I'm just tryna leave the crib Go out and live tonight ♪
♪ Shit, fuck that I'm locked in the lab, workin' ♪
♪ Droppin' a track Beats get bodied and bagged, certain ♪
♪ See the world Through first, second and third person ♪
♪ Omniscient, listenin' so efficient ♪
♪ Trapped in my own goal line Ready to go the distance ♪
♪ Consider it a privilege That you get to witness ♪
♪ History in the makin' You fuckin' bitches ♪
♪ Just playin' with y'all ♪
♪ Still in line Waitin' for my name to get called, yo ♪
[funky music playing]
[music fades]