Black comedians, particularly when performing for a predominantly black audience, are at some point faced with the rather unfunny task of talking about the fairly horrifying realities of being black in America. Richard Pryor (for me, stand-up comedy's poet laureate) tackled this with crazily inspired mimicry and insight. Eddie Murphy went about it with ruthless irreverence. Bill Cosby did it with gloss and denial, eschewing the grittier realities as well as he stayed away from the F-word. Chris Rock, new heavyweight champion, is outraged and desperate. He seems very upset about America, doubly upset about the black plight and ferociously upset to be the one who has to talk about it.

It comes across in his Screamin' Jay Hawkins vocal style, and the way he stalks the stage. His whole essence screams; his small, whippy frame is like a pain-absorbing spring mechanism that coils up to a certain pressure-point, then explodes back with a barrage of raspy barks through his alarmed-looking head. He needs to holler, and he's great at it, but the humor in this round of material doesn't quite outrun the roaring sadness that generated it. After an hour of Rock wringing and pacing and screaming, we still loved the guy, but we came away feeling scraped and reprimanded, and like we'd just seen someone forced to be a social conscience who really doesn't want to be a social conscience at all. It's almost as if Rock sees the situation as being so urgent that he doesn't have any choice.

"Bigger and Blacker" began with some new Rock riffs on being black in America, more of the same stuff that made his 1997 show "Roll with the New" a critical hit. It's a daring shtick that would get a white guy killed, but there's a moralistic, finger-wagging aspect to it as well. Mothers shouldn't be out nightclubbing while the kids are at home: "If you grow up calling your grandmother 'mommy' and your mother 'Pam,' you goin' to jail!" Dad should pay the bills and keep the lights on so the kids can do homework, etc. Rock discouraged homophobia: "Whoever you hate WILL end up in your family. If you're homophobic, you gonna have a gay son." He discussed the desperate need for new black leaders, describing everyone after Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. as "substitute teachers." Rock then delved vigorously into the kinds of issues he appeared to think an ideal black leader would address -- criticism of the NYPD, medical insurance, pharmaceutical corporations, the disparity between retail venues in white and black neighborhoods, etc. -- and stopped barely shy of preaching his show into a depressive coma, then put the cap on the whole rant by kicking up a big ruckus against the idea of his being a "role model," which in his mind is tantamount to being called a "good nigger." Before that line, which essentially expressed "I'm not your new black motherfucking leader" in so many words, he might have been running for governor, and might even have won.

All of this stuff was hardcore and true and brave and all. Was it comedy? Well, he's a wonderfully funny guy. But jeez, it mostly smarts.

Rock's funniest bits were the lightest, such as his fancy jig-dancing enthusiasm for the Ricky Martin hit "Livin' La Vida Loca," which he described as the "Whoomp! There It Is" crossover of Hispanic music. Again, you really had to be there.

Late into the set, in a way that almost made it seem like comedy relief from the bludgeoning reality of his comedy act, Rock degenerated into an antique, battle-of-the-sexist blue rant ` la Redd Foxx. No sensitive new-age puss-male, Mr. Rock. This material was weak, offensive without being particularly funny and had already been chewed to death in the '60s and early '70s by every seedy hack-bastard comic who ever emceed a strip club. I'm not the type to get my panties in a ringer about this type of misogyny-lite, as long as it's funny, but this section was all shite we'd heard ad nauseam: how women should be willing to give more blow jobs; how women really need to shut the fuck up, because they talk too much; how women are mostly in relationships to get their bills paid. Blah blah blah. He also mused on the tried and true clichi of how all men are dogs, incapable of fidelity, if tempted. "A man is only as faithful as his options," sayeth the Rock.

It was all more or less a seamy look at the inner workings of Rock's agitated sex life and his surprisingly unenlightened relationships with women in general, and seemed, well, (cough) beneath him. I didn't identify with it at all, but maybe I wasn't supposed to; maybe it was a black guy thang. But seriously, compared to Chris Rock, Richard Pryor is practically Dr. Leo Buscaglia.

What I found the most hair-raising in Rock's monologue, and which I've encountered a bit of lately in other venues, is that there is a recent public trend of black people, in a relaxed fashion, outspokenly and without malice, talking about how much they hate whitey. This isn't due to weird, zealoty white-devil rhetoric or fevered militancy, but is the honest result of a simple, profound, multi-generational resentment, which has always existed, but is usually kept hidden under the mild social politeness that has always kept integrated society from dissolving into total mayhem. This hatred is well deserved and understandable, I reckon, but it will make you just the slightest bit uncomfortable if it is being brazenly acknowledged by a beloved comedian and you are one of 15 white people in the entire sold-out Apollo Theatre in Harlem. We weren't nervous, everyone was perfectly nice to us, nobody mad-dogged us at the bar, but there was definitely a "one of these things just doesn't belong here" vibe. It wasn't scary, but it was a real eye-opener. Harlem is a real eye-opener. As robust and fierce-humored and vivid as the inhabitants are, if you have any kind of sensitive, bleeding heart, Harlem will bust it right in the chops and knock your privileged liberal worldview sideways: It's just so goddamned poor. Even the walls of the legendary Apollo are peeling.

"There's a policy here at the Apollo," teased the warm-up comic. "If you're white, and you've never been here before, welcome -- just remember to give all of your money to the nearest black person upon exiting the theater. We call it 'reparations.'" The Apollo audience erupted into the deafening white-noise blur of claps and howls louder than any audience I've ever heard; a sound so thick and round it feels like you can walk off the balcony onto it. We clapped too. Heh heh heh heh heh, ho ho. Ahem.

Rock, at this point, for all his expert funniness, is like a severed head on a post: eloquent, but above all, a warning, and evoking of a marrow-deep chill. Maybe there just isn't room for really funny material nowadays. Maybe that would just be unforgivably irresponsible. Maybe things have just gotten way too unfunny, at this point. It's a shame to feel denied a totally unencumbered Chris Rock, a soaring, radiant talent that didn't have to be weighed down with all that socially important shit. But, well, things need to change. If the world were a nicer place, Chris Rock would be a funnier guy. Whoomp. There it is.