Dave Chappelle will open New York Comedy Festival with Madison Square Garden tour finale
TheGrio...
The comedian joins the festival lineup as he announces a new slate of phone-free arena shows across North America.
Dave Chappelle will end his tour at the same moment the New York Comedy Festival begins.
Variety reported that the comedian has been added as a festival headliner and will open the event with a Nov. 6 performance at Madison Square Garden, the final stop on a newly announced run of arena dates. He joins a lineup that includes Marc Maron, Ilana Glazer and Daniel Sloss.
The stretch begins Oct. 20 at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, followed by Charlotte’s Spectrum Center the next night. From there Chappelle moves to Scotiabank Arena in Toronto on Oct. 23, the KFC Yum! Center in Louisville on Oct. 24, Austin’s Moody Center on Oct. 26 and the Toyota Center in Houston on Oct. 28.
Every date will be a phone-free experience, with devices locked in Yondr pouches for the duration. Chappelle has enforced that policy for years, and it has become as much a part of his live shows as the material itself, keeping unreleased jokes off social media and out of the news cycle before he chooses to release them.
Caroline Hirsch, who founded and owns the New York Comedy Festival, framed the booking as a significant get. She described Chappelle as one of the defining comedians of his generation and, without qualification, among the greatest stand-ups ever, calling it spectacular that he would close his tour by opening her festival.
The fall dates follow a productive summer. Chappelle ran a June arena stretch through Baltimore, Detroit, Cleveland, Chicago and San Diego before heading home to Yellow Springs, Ohio, for the sixth edition of his “Summer Camp” event, which has become an annual fixture in the small town where he lives.
Ticket details are staggered for the New York show. A presale opens Sept. 15 at 10 a.m. ET, with general sale following on Sept. 17 through the festival’s website.
The Madison Square Garden booking carries obvious weight for any performer, but particularly for a comedian closing out a tour rather than launching one.
Chappelle has played the venue before, and choosing it as an endpoint rather than a centerpiece suggests he intends to finish the run at its largest possible scale rather than build toward it.