Dave Chappelle: Grape Drink

In this clip from For What It’s Worth, Dave Chappelle discusses stereotypes in what different races and ethnicities eat and drink. Moreover, in discussing his own race, Chappelle embraces and appropriates the stereotypes of African Americans and their food.

After questioning why anyone would ever make fun of someone for liking chicken and watermelon, Chappelle goes on to say that no one can make fun of white people’s food because no one really knows what white people like to eat; apparently we have been good at keeping that shit a secret. Chappelle, however, claims that he has been doing independent research and has found out what white people love: grape juice.

At this point, Chappelle does not really elaborate on white people’s love for grape juice, but rather, states that a lot of black people have not had the privilege of knowing about grape juice, but instead, are quite familiar with grape drink. The difference, according to Chappelle, is that drink does not have any vitamins, which has no effect on black people’s love for their drink. In fact, Chappelle makes up a hypothetical situation in which a white guy asks his black friend if he would care for some grape juice, which leads to the black guy saying “I want some grape drink, baby”.

Chappelle furthers his argument that black people love their drink by reminiscing about a Sunny-D commercial. In this commercial, all the kids jump for joy as they find out that there is some Sunny-D in the fridge, but Chappelle claims there is one black kid in the background licking his lips who whispers “I want that purple stuff”.

This clip is not only hilarious, but also is interesting as Chappelle is able to create laughs with out having to explain anything to the crowd. Further, the underlying point of the drink bit is that drink is much cheaper than juice, but Chappelle does not explain this, rather, it appears that he and the crowd have a mutual understanding about drink. While some may look at drink as inferior to juice, Chappelle appropriates and makes fun of grape drink’s deliciousness, which only has three ingredients: sugar, water, and purple.