Chevy Chase’s daughter, Caley Chase, says that the cast and crew of Community heckled Chevy during a wrap party for the show.
“My dad was super excited to bring me and my mom to the wrap party,” Caley, 40, recalls in the CNN documentary I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not. “We walk in, [Community creator] Dan [Harmon], he had had some drinks. He had gotten the whole cast and crew to yell, ‘F*** you, Chevy!’ ‘F*** you, Chevy!’”
Caley continues, “I’m there, he’s showing his daughter, like, ‘This is the show I did,’ and we walk in to ‘F*** you, Chevy!’ That’s rough and mean.”
The NBC sitcom, which followed the antics of a community college study group, premiered in 2009 and was canceled after five seasons. It was revived for a sixth and final season on the short-lived streaming platform Yahoo! Screen in 2015.
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Chevy, 82, played Pierce Hawthorne and left the series in 2012 after using the N-word on the set. Community director Jay Chandrasekhar, among the talking heads in I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not, says the incident occurred during a “blackface” hand puppet bit written for Chevy’s character. His costar, Yvette Nicole Brown, was witness to it.
“I know that there was a history between [Chevy and Yvette] around race, and she got up and stormed out of there,” Chandrasekhar, 57, recalls in the doc. “Chevy storms off, so the producer is like, ‘We need Yvette in the scene, right?’ I’m like, ‘Yeah, she’s in the next scene.’ And he goes, ‘Well, she won’t come out unless Chevy apologizes to her.’”
According to Chandrasekhar, Chevy claimed he “didn’t say anything” to offend Brown, 54, and when the director asked him to apologize, ‘[Chevy] goes, ‘For what?’”
After The Hollywood Reporter published a story about the episode, Chandrasekhar said that Chevy came “storming onto the set, and he goes, ‘Who f***ed me over?’ … My career is ruined! I’m ruined!’ Like, it’s a full meltdown. ‘F*** all of you!’ And I’m like, ‘Alright, let’s shoot the scene.’ He never ended up coming back after that.”
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Chevy had clashed with Harmon, 52, during his time on the show, and months prior to Chevy’s departure, Harmon was dismissed as showrunner weeks after leaking an angry voicemail from Chevy that circulated online. (Harmon returned to the Community writer’s room in 2013.)
“I have no idea if we’re OK,” Chevy said of his relationship with Harmon on the “WTF with Marc Maron” podcast in 2023. “I’ve never been not OK. He’s kind of a pisser. He’s angry. He called and said he was sorry. I love him now.”
At the time, Brown reacted to his podcast interview via X, quipping, “He seems nice.” She also replied to a fan who asked if she would ever address her working dynamic with Chase, writing, “Never have. Probably never will.”
I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not premieres on CNN on January 1 at 8 p.m. ET.
