Today, we’re going to dive into a forgotten corner of TV and comedy history. In 2002, Chevy Chase was roasted for the second time in the Friar’s Club. Despite being largely forgotten, this event would have massive ripple effects. If you’ve ever watched a roast in the past two decades, especially on Comedy Central, chances are you’ve seen those ripples. Not to mention, the roast was enough to make Chase break down in tears, and reconsider his entire life. But I’m getting ahead of myself. We’ll get to the roast in good time. But to understand what happened there, it’s important to understand why all of it happened (and on the plus side, there’s a whole lot of tasty side drama in the comedy world). First, we have to answer the question “Who is Chevy Chase”?

I’m Chevy Chase, who the hell are you?

Born in 1947, Chevy Chase is a world renowned American comedian. Well, maybe not world renowned, but at least famous in America. Maybe not famous per se, but at least still decently well known. You’ve seen him in something. Probably.

Chase started his career like many comedians, running around and trying everything he could. Writing satirical articles, founding a comedy ensemble, working for a satirical radio show, etc. Finally, his work paid off. He became a writer for a show called “Not Ready For Prime Time Players”, better known by its later title: Saturday Night Live.

Because a sudden rise to fame has never gone to anyone’s head.

Shortly before the show first aired, Chase was added to the cast, and joined rehearsals. This became his big break, putting him squarely in the spotlight. He introduced every show but two, and was the anchor for Weekend Update, one of the show’s longest running bits. His catchphrase “I’m Chevy Chase, and you’re not” became extremely famous. He even claimed that his Weekend Update style was the direct inspiration for later comedy news programs like the Daily Show. During the show’s run, Chase won two Emmy awards and a Golden Globe for his work on the show, and many have argued since that he “defined the franchise”. Chase was a hit at the time, and was shortlisted by many as one of the funniest rising comedians in America. Someone even suggested that Chase could be the only person to replace the beloved Johnny Carson (although Carson disliked Chase, and replied that “He couldn’t ad-lib a fart after a baked bean dinner”).

Live from New York, it’s literally anyone but Chevy Chase!

Chevy left SNL a few episodes into the second season, the reason for which is still unclear. Chase 's official story claims that his girlfriend didn’t want to move out to New York, so he decided to move out to LA and marry her. That story is somewhat backed up by the fact that he’d negotiated out of most of season 2 in his contract with NBC, surprising producer Lorne Michaels (who hadn’t been informed). However, there’s still suspicion surrounding the episodes he was in. Supposedly, he injured his groin doing a pratfall in the first episode, forcing him to be hospitalized for the next two episodes. However, as eagle eyed fans noticed, the “injured” Chase was very clearly seen at the end of the first episode dancing around without any issue. Many have theorized that the episodes were a test run, to see if the show could work without Chevy, in anticipation of him leaving. Years later, an anonymous SNL cast member mentioned that he only used his engagement as an excuse to pin it on his (now ex) wife. In reality, he’d left the show purely out of a desire to make more money.

But why would the show want to see one of it’s most popular actors gone? Well, as it would later come out, Chase was a massive pain to work with. Egotistical, cruel, and petty, he burned a lot of bridges with his fellow cast members, as well as producer Lorne Michaels. When he returned to host in Season 3, Chase reported the atmosphere felt “poisoned” against him, and he certainly didn’t help himself by ordering people around, and trying to reclaim his spot on Weekend Update, all while using a frankly terrifying amount of drugs. Bill Murray (Chase’s replacement) was antagonistic towards him, telling Chase frankly that no one there liked him, leading to a shouting match. Murray then told Chase “Go fuck your wife, she needs it” (Chase was having public marriage issues at the time). All of this culminated into Chase hunting Murray down minutes before the show, and challenging him to a fight. If you look closely at Chase’s monologue, you can see some marks on his face from where Murray hit him. Chase would go on to host eight more times, racking up more and more problems every time. He’d harass female writers, make cruel jokes (like telling an openly gay cast member he should do a sketch about dying from AIDs) and generally just be a jackass to everyone involved. This came to a head in 1997, when he slapped Cheri Oteri hard in the back of the head, causing a furious Will Ferrell to bring the issue to Lorne Michaels, who banned Chase from the show. Chase was the 12th person to be banned from SNL, and the only former cast member to ever be banned from hosting. Although he’s made a few guest appearances on SNL since, they’re kept few and far between, and the hosting ban has been enforced.

You win some, you lose thirty or forty others.

Chase would initially find success striking out on his own, starring in a number of classic comedies like Caddyshack (alongside Bill Murray funny enough), Three Amigos, National Lampoon’s Vacation, and National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. However, Chase’s success wasn’t for long. He has been in a total of 62 different movies and TV shows, most of which are… they’re bad. There’s just no other way to put it. He milked National Lampoon’s Vacation for six total movies, with the quality going downhill each time. He also tried to launch his own celebrity talk show, which bombed and was cancelled just four weeks in. His most recent movie in 2021 was Panda vs Aliens, which is… I mean, it’s exactly what you’d expect. After Chase’s initial success, he made bomb after box office bomb, with the failures seriously damaging his ego. He’d reportedly talked a lot of shit at SNL about how everyone else had no chance at a career, so seeing his former castmates all become more famous than him had to sting.

Chase’s one big hit later in life was Community, a show where he played a self centered egotistical old man with some seriously dated views. It’s like the role was made for him. Members of the cast have been frank about how they only got a celebrity like Chase for such an unknown show was because of how far Chase had fallen, and as the show turned into a surprise hit, it seemed like it might be his ticket back to the top. However, Chase had serious issues on set. His toxic behavior continued, and he had serious issues with director Dan Harmon. At one point, he even refused to do a pivotal scene on the last day of filming, which required scrapping the entire scene. Harmon then made fun of Chase at the wrap party, playing some of the angry voicemails Chase had left him. Chase then left another angry voicemail, which Harmon played at a live event. Eventually, Chase was forced to leave the show after yelling the N-word during a heated argument on set. Later, costar Donald Glover would confirm that Chase would make frequent racial jokes or insults between scenes, trying to get Glover to crack or perform poorly.

The best worst hits

The behavior that cost Chevy both SNL and Community was present throughout his entire career (and frankly, his personal life too). It’d take too long to go through every single instance, but some include:

• Chris Columbus quit directing National Lampoon’s Vacation before a single day of filming, because he had one dinner with Chevy where he was “treated like dirt”.

• On the cast of Community, he told a female cast member “I want to kill you and rape you”.

• His wife Jacqueline Carlin divorced him after just over a year, due to him making violent threats against her

• During a stunt in Three Amigos, Chase made a joke about director John Landis’s lax safety precautions after his last film. The film in question? The Twilight Zone, where a stunt gone wrong killed a man and two children.

• Kevin Smith met with him to discuss relaunching the popular Fletch series, where Chevy “went on to claim he invented every funny thing that ever happened in the history of not just comedy, but also the known world”. That one lunch ended any possibility of the series.

• Rob Huebel, a fan of Chase’s approached him backstage to shake his hand, upon which Chase slapped him hard across the face

• Yvette Nicole Brown was asked who she would kick off of Community if she could, and answered with “Chevy Chase” before the interviewer even finished the question. She, along with Glover, has noted Chase’s stream of racism towards them even before yelling the N-word.

TL;DR

Chase is known for being incredibly difficult to work with, making cruel, insensitive, and bigoted comments towards those around him. Combined with a massive ego, and a career that tanked just a few years after it took off, Chase has a lot of issues both personally and professionally.

Just a bit more backstory, I promise.

Before we get to the big event, there’s just two important pieces of the story left: The Friar’s club itself, and Chase’s first roast.

What is the Friar’s Club?

The Friar’s club is a 118 year old New York club whose membership includes some of the best known American comedians of all time, along with a number of other celebrities. There’s too many to list, but reading through their members, it was harder to find a famous person in entertainment that wasn’t one of them than to find one who was. It’s gone a bit downhill in recent years, but at the time, it still had a massive cultural impact. They also essentially invented what we now know as the roast, starting it as an in-house tradition in 1950, which they would later record and air on Comedy Central. The tagline was always “We only roast the ones we love”, and you had to be a member to participate in the roast (as well as usually being a good friend of the roastee). Their list of roasts includes some truly iconic names, all of whom were trashed by some of the best comedians of the era. And also Chevy Chase.

In 1998, Comedy Central signed a contract with the Friar’s club to air their roasts. Now, the jokes and insults were no longer the subject of speculation and gossip, known only by the elite few who could witness it, everybody got to see the roast. This also marked a shift from some of the more classic comedic roasts to more modern content: swearing, sex jokes, etc. Once again, the Friar’s club sent out ripples that would shape the future of comedy.

The first roast

Chase had been roasted once before in 1990, and apparently enjoyed the experience. The roastmaster was Dan Akroyd, with Clint Eastwood, Neil Simon, Larry King, Robin Leach, Richard Lewis, Gilbert Gottfried, Rita Rudner, Dana Carvey, Phil Hartman, Jon Lovitz, Dennis Miller and Lorne Michaels doing the roasting. The guests and audience included many of his close friends (along with celebrities like Rober DeNiro and Richard Pryor), who poked fun at Chase and his career. There’s no recording of it, but reportedly, Chase’s enjoyment of the experience was why he would agree to come back a second time.

At this point, Chevy was still 100% a douchebag, but his douchiness hadn’t peaked yet, and his career was still looking good. He was riding the high of Christmas Vacation, and the end of his career wouldn’t come until 1991, when three of his big films all flopped in a row. He hadn’t yet been banned from SNL, and while many of the people who worked with him were aware of his reputation, it wasn’t quite as publicly known.

Finally, the big roast

If you want, you can watch the full roast here. I highly recommend that you do, just because words can’t really convey the atmosphere of it (and also 'cause it’s funny to watch Chevy Chase get mocked). If you don’t, no worries, the whole thing will be recapped below.

The roastmaster (picked by Chase) was Paul Shaffer. The roasters were Todd Barry, Richard Belzer, Stephen Colbert, Beverly D’Angelo, Al Franken, Greg Giraldo, Lisa Lampanelli, Nathan Lane, Marc Maron, Steve Martin, Laraine Newman, Randy Quaid, Freddie Roman, and Martin Short.

Who the fuck are these guys?

If you read through that list of names and barely recognized anyone, you wouldn’t be alone. Besides Colbert (who was still relatively unknown at the time) and Al Franken (who’s famous for… other reasons now), there were no really famous people present. Steve Martin and Martin Short didn’t even show up, they just sent in a pre-recorded video, as did Randy Quaid.

Not only were most of the roasters unknown to the audience, but to Chase himself. As they repeated throughout the roast, most of them were younger, and knew Chase only through watching him. They’d never worked with him before, or even met him before they were asked to tear him apart on TV. The only three that really had any connection to Chevy were former SNL castmate Laraine Newman, SNL’s band member Paul Shaffer, and Beverly D’Angelo, who had played his wife in National Lampoon’s vacation. (I’m aware that Al Franken had a connection, but I’m refusing to acknowledge his existence).

Reportedly, Chase would later ask one of the producers for the show why they hadn’t invited any famous people. The simple answer was that they had… and everyone refused the invitation. “We only roast the ones we love” stopped being a sweet message, and became a condemnation. They didn’t show up to roast him because they didn’t love him.

The jokes varied, but most of them focused around a few main topics:

• Chase’s failed career, and the number of terrible movies he’d done.

Paul Shaffer: You made us laugh so much. And then inexplicably stopped in about 1978. Marc Maron: At least I am a nobody at the beginning of my career.

• The fact that none of Chevy’s former friends or co-stars were willing to show up, so much so that they literally had a song and dance number called “We couldn’t get anybody good”. The song included the line

An OJ roast would have drawn more star power!

Martin and Short also joked in their video that they couldn’t come because were filming the Three Amigos sequel without Chevy… a joke that probably would have been a lot funnier for Chase if the two of them weren’t actually making a number of movies together without him.

• Chase’s drug addiction, which he had struggled with for years, and went to rehab for

Greg Giraldo: Chevy is living proof that you could actually snort the funniness right out of yourself

• Chase generally being a dick

Laraine Newman (reading from her “diary” about the first SNL cast): Danny is hilarious, and has invited everyone up to his bar in Canada. Belushi is a little gruff, but it’s obvious he’s a sweetheart. Chevy said to me “You know, the Holocaust never really happened”.

That joke was in response to Chevy’s reputation for antisemitism, which another roaster would mock by chanting in Hebrew during the roast.

Hobbit said knock you out

However, probably the most brutal roast of all came from Stephen Colbert. If you watch only one part of the roast, make sure it’s these few minutes. Unlike the others, Colbert didn’t swear much, or rip into Chevy’s personal life. He even joked about how shocked he was by people’s cruelty towards Chevy. Colbert tore Chase apart by getting deep into his insecurities, joking about his washed up career, with lines like:

The only thing I think of when I look at this man is there but for the grace of God go I. Why would I tempt the comedy gods to strike me down like this?

A comedy lamprey, just sucking the joy out of everything I touch.

But for some of these people, [fame] went to their head … but this man never forgot what got him wherever he thinks he is.

Before you attack him, think: There may come a day in your darkest hour when you are a shadow of your, albeit paper-thin self. And when that day comes, I hope that you are cheered up by something that Mr. Chase so famously said, “He’s Chevy Chase and you’re not.” If that doesn’t cheer you up, then I don’t know what will.

Turning Chase’s most iconic line into a burn against him had to sting, but Colbert’s entire speech impacted Chase pretty heavily. With the others, the jokes were almost too over the top, it was easier to laugh them off. Imagine the difference between someone telling you “I fucked your mom” vs “You have been nothing but a disappointment to your mother. You’ll never be good enough for her.” Colbert tore Chase apart with the precision of a surgeon, all with a pleasant grin on his face.

I hope this doesn’t awaken anything in me

After Colbert was “Sir” Randy Quaid, whose poetry tribute to Chevy was… it’s an experience. This has basically no relation to any of the rest of the drama, but it’s too bizarre for me to not mention it here. It features a swimsuit-clad Quaid frolicking in a pool, moving into various sexual poses as his voiceover recites a Shakespearean poem. Eventually, he moves towards a pair of women’s legs spread wide… which have a picture of Chevy Chase over the genitals.

You may now pause reading to go scrub your eyes with bleach.

The grand finale

As the last roaster left the podium, and as Chase was thanked for being a good sport by the head of the Friar’s Club, all eyes turned to him. This was his big moment, his time to strike back at everyone. You can say a lot of things about Chevy Chase, but lacking the ability to insult people isn’t one.

Chevy took the podium, and… not much happened. He kicked it off by saying “I agree with everything that’s been said”, threw back a joke or two, then left. His voice broke as he noted that this would be the time the roastee got even with all the other comedians, “but there just fucking aren’t any”. In total, the whole thing took around 80 seconds, much of which Chevy was silent for. When he did speak, his trademark arrogance and bravado was gone.

And he cried like a baby coming home from the bar

Chase himself admitted that after the show, he went back to his hotel room and had a breakdown. He reportedly cried for hours in a depressive state, with Paul Shaffer coming to comfort him. According to Chevy, the roast was the moment he hit rock bottom, when he truly realized how badly he’d fucked up with his former friends. The roast truly devastated Chevy, and would haunt him for years to come.

Looking back through the broadcast, you can see an almost linear progression of Chevy’s reactions, growing more and more stolid as it went on. He’d barely react to jokes beyond the bare minimum, or sometimes not react at all. He just sat there stone faced with sunglasses on.

The show was supposedly pretty uncomfortable for everyone else. Looking back at past Friar’s club roasts, it’s hard to not notice the difference in the atmosphere. Members of the crew, audience, and cast have all expressed some levels of discomfort with what happened, and many of them just wanted to move on and act like it never occurred. Even in previous roasts, no matter what was said, you could fall back on the fact that people liked you. The sad fact is, nobody in that room really liked Chevy all that much, and a decent number of them hated him.

Reportedly, Chase even insisted that certain jokes be cut entirely from the show before it was broadcast. I was unable to find proof of if Chase was specifically involved, but the broadcast has clearly been edited. There’s shots where Chase seems to transition from his sunglasses to his regular glasses quickly, and some of his roasters seemed to have vastly different speaking times. Some of them barely even mentioned Chevy, so the idea that some of their jokes got cut isn’t too far fetched. Compared to the other Friars Club roasts that aired, this one ran on the shorter end, suggesting there could be around 5-8 minutes of cut footage. And considering what actually made it onto the broadcast, you have to wonder how truly gut wrenching those insults must have been.

Regardless of editing, Comedy Central would only ever air it once before shelving it.

What comes next?

At some points during this writeup, you may have wondered where the big sweeping changes were. After all, a roast of a celebrity by a bunch of strangers, many of whom aren’t comedians, who use extremely personal jokes and attacks? That’s not anything special, it’s pretty much every major roast, especially on Comedy Central.

The thing is, this roast is a large part of what created all of those. Obviously, it’s less shocking to us now, because it has become the norm, but at the time, this was an entirely new experience. And it was an experience that Comedy Central jumped on with enthusiasm. After Chase’s roast, their five year contract with the Friar’s club ended, and it was not renewed. Some suggested that Chase personally sabotaged the deal, although more likely it just represented the end of a short experiment. Comedy Central then started producing their own roasts, following the new model. Turns out, people are a lot more entertained by celebrity drama than close friendships, and they’re happy to see someone famous knocked down a peg or two. Plus, you don’t need to actually get comedians if you just hire a writing team for all the celebrity guests, and star power attracts a lot of viewers.

Roasts have since become a classic part of comedy culture, with Comedy Central firmly at the peak, and Chase’s legacy enshrined forever – just maybe not the way he’d want it to be.

Believe it or not, Chase is still an asshole. He has gone in and out of retirement, currently stating that he’s only semi-retired. He also tried to convince Lorne Michaels to let him host SNL again… just minutes before he walked his daughter down the aisle at her wedding. Priorities man. If you want to take the time, there’s a good Washington Post article that dives into Chevy, and discusses the nuances, exploring his abusive childhood without excusing his current behavior.

Also, the roast was spoofed by American Dad, sunglasses and all. Funnily enough, that’s how I learned about this, and decided to make a writeup.

I guess the moral of the story is simple: If you’re an asshole, a narcissist, a bigot, a douchebag, a sexist, a failure in every conceivable way… at least you’re not Chevy Chase.

This is a repost from reddit. Credit goes to /u/EquivalentInflation. Read the original here