Chevy Chase is speaking out about accusations that he’s difficult to work with. In a new interview with CBS Sunday Morning, the legendary actor and comedian, 78, addressed accusations of his bad behavior during his time on NBC’s Saturday Night Live and the hit Dan Harmon comedy Community, Chase making it clear that he doesn’t really care what others think of him.
Asked by CBS correspondent Jim Axelrod about allegations about his behavior, Chase offered a candid response. The actor told Axelrod with a laugh, “I guess you’d have to ask them. I don’t give a crap!” Chase went on to state, “I am who I am. And I like where, who I am. I don’t care. And it’s part of me that I don’t care.” Chase explained that he has “thought about that a lot. And I don’t know what to tell you, man. I just don’t care.”
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Chase’s remarks followed years of accusations regarding his on-set behavior, particularly during his time on Community. In a February 2018 profile published in The New Yorker, both Harmon and Community star Donald Glover alleged Chase told racist jokes on the set of the show. Harmon recalled that Chase “was the first to realize how immensely gifted Donald was, and the way he expressed his jealousy was to try to throw Donald off. I remember apologizing to Donald after a particularly rough night of Chevy’s non-P.C. verbiage, and Donald said, ‘I don’t even worry about it.’” Those jokes reportedly included things like, “People think you’re funnier because you’re Black.”
“I just saw Chevy as fighting time – a true artist has to be OK with his reign being over. I can’t help him if he’s thrashing in the water. But I know there’s a human in there somewhere – he’s almost too human,” Glover added.
At around the same time, Saturday Night Live cast member Pete Davidson blasted Chase as a “f—ing d-bag.” In an interview on The Howard Stern Show in September 2018, Davidson said Chase was “just a genuinely bad, racist person and I don’t like him. He’s a putz.” Davidson also addressed remarks Chase made in an interview with the Washington Post in which he said SNL had gone “downhill,” with Davidson calling Chase’s remarks “disrespectful.”
Chase starred on Community as Pierce Hawthorne from 2009 until 2014. He appeared on Saturday Night Live from 1975 until 2013. His other credits include the National Lampoon’s Vacation movies, Three Amigos!, Chuck, and The Last Laugh, among many others.
