Chevy Chase is addressing his exclusion from “SNL50: The Anniversary Special.” In CNN Films’ upcoming documentary, “I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not” (via People), the original “Saturday Night Live” cast member admitted he was “hurt” by not being included in the milestone anniversary celebration.
“Well, it was kind of upsetting actually,” Chase said. “This is probably the first time I’m saying it. But I expected that I would’ve been on the stage too with all the other actors. When Garrett [Morris] and Laraine [Newman] went on the stage there, I was curious as to why I didn’t. No one asked me to. Why was I left aside?”
Chase, the first anchor and co-creator of “Weekend Update,” also expressed confusion over “SNL50’s” segment of the satirical news program, saying, “Why was Bill Murray there and why was I not? I don’t have an answer for that.”
“I did bring it up once in a text to Lorne and then took it back,” Chase said, referring to “SNL” creator Lorne Michaels. “I said, ‘Okay, I take it back, silly.’ But it’s not that silly. Somebody’s made a bad mistake there. I don’t know who it was, but somebody made a mistake. They should’ve had me on that stage. It hurt.”
Chase attended the 50th anniversary special in February of this year. According to the CNN documentary, the anniversary show was initially set to feature more of Chase, with the actor’s wife, Jayni Chase, explaining that people “told Chevy up until that day that there were two bits, they were going back and forth.”
“And then, all of the sudden, ‘No, there’s no bit,’” she added.
“There were a couple versions of [‘Weekend Update’] and we went back and forth on that,” Michaels said in the doc. “There was also a caution from somebody that I don’t want to name that Chevy, you know, wasn’t as focused.”
“I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not” premieres on Jan. 1 at 8 p.m. ET/PT on CNN.
