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In a surprise announcement Wednesday, Comedy Central said that the highly anticipated third season of Dave Chappelle's show will not make its May 31 premiere date.

"Comedy Central has suspended production on the third season of Chappelle's Show until further notice," network spokesman Tony Fox said in a brief statement. "All parties are optimistic that production will resume in the near future."

No official reason was given for the shutdown, but sources told E! News that Chappelle has been MIA from the set for weeks. There was no indication on how long the suspension would last.

In December, the network said that Chappelle's Show was behind schedule after Chappelle fell ill, forcing the network to postpone the expected February debut of new episodes.

"Dave--and his entire production crew for that matter--got a bit of a late start on writing season three," Fox told the New York Post. Production was slated to resume in January.

Last August, Chappelle, 31, reupped with Comedy Central in a massive two-year deal, valued at $50 million by the Hollywood Reporter. The deal also set a new Industry precedent--reportedly giving the funnyman a large cut of backend DVD sales.

Featuring Chappelle's often raunchy standup, offbeat sketches and killer parodies of Prince and Rick James, Chappelle's Show has steadily built a huge following since its debut in January of 2003. By the end of season two, the half-hour show was often pulling in more than three million viewers, a substantial number for basic cable. The first season currently ranks as the all-time top-selling TV show on DVD. (Paramount has indefinitely pushed back the release of the second season--the studio hopes to time the DVD to the start of season three.)

In addition to his gig at Comedy Central, Chappelle had been working on a book for Hyperion. There has been no word on the book's status; there's also no word on the reported Rick James biopic for Paramount in which Chappelle would portray the late R&B wild man.

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Originally posted by Rob:
He's dead.

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Originally posted by Rob:
Come on. He's black.

$10 he was shot.

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i think it would have hit the net by now if he were in jail.. unless he's in a mexican prison.. has he ever made fun of mexicans?

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Last August, Chappelle, 31, reupped with Comedy Central in a massive two-year deal, valued at $50 million by the Hollywood Reporter.

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Chappelle shows up at comedy clubs

Trade magazine, humor site say comedian back in U.S.

Friday, June 3, 2005 Posted: 2:37 PM EDT (1837 GMT)


LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Is Dave Chappelle back?

The AWOL comedian dropped in unannounced at two popular comedy clubs Thursday night, saying he had just arrived in Los Angeles and felt like performing, Daily Variety reported Friday. Entertainment Weekly reported CollegeHumor.com made note of Chappelle's appearance at a show sponsored by the site. (See storyexternal link.)

Chappelle served up some impromptu standup to stunned audiences at the Hollywood Improv and the Comedy Store, the trade paper said.

Chappelle, 31, took off last month to South Africa for a "spiritual retreat," leaving his fans -- and even his agent and publicist -- wondering where he went.

After Comedy Central announced that the planned May 31 debut of the third season of "Chappelle's Show" had been postponed, the magazine Entertainment Weekly reported that Chappelle had checked himself into a mental health facility in South Africa.

But Chappelle denied checking into a mental facility or having a drug problem in an interview with Time magazine.

Instead, he fled to stay with friends in Durban because he wasn't happy with the direction of the show, which is behind only "South Park" as Comedy Central's most-watched program.

Calls to Chappelle's publicist and Comedy Central were not immediately returned Friday morning.

An unnamed Comedy Central representative told Variety that network officials would be sitting down with Chappelle to talk business "really, really soon."