This didn’t quite hit the funny bone for Chevy Chase.
The comedian, 82, revealed that being excluded from “SNL50: The Anniversary Special” was a hurtful moment.
“Well, it was kind of upsetting actually,” Chase said in the upcoming CNN documentary, “I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not.”
“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?”
He added about the special’s “Weekend Update” segment: “Why was Bill Murray there and why was I not? I don’t have an answer for that.”
Chase was the first anchor of the segment during the show’s debut season in 1975. The actor was an original cast member alongside Morris, 88, Newman, 73, Dan Aykroyd, 73, John Belushi, Jane Curtin, 78, and Gilda Radner.
Chase left in the middle of Season 2 in 1976. However, the “National Lampoon’s Vacation” star hosted “SNL” eight times times between 1978 and 1997.
“I did bring it up once in a text to Lorne [Michaels] and then took it back,” Chase admitted. “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.”
Despite not being asked to join in on the festivities, Jimmy Fallon gave the comic a mention during “SNL 50: The Homecoming Concert,” days before the main show.
Chase’s wife Jayni revealed in the doc that her husband was supposed to have a larger role in the special.
She said 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,’” stated Jayni, 68.
Michaels, 81, confirmed the news himself.
“There were a couple versions of [‘Weekend Update’] and we went back and forth on that,” he shared 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.”
Regardless of not being included in the special, Chase still set foot in his old stomping grounds at Studio 8H for the comedy series’ 50th anniversary special.
He has notoriously had a tumultuous relationship with the NBC variety show throughout the years.
At the time, “Saturday Night” director Jason Reitman also revealed what the comedian’s response was to his 2024 film, which details the 90 minutes leading up to the first-ever broadcast of “SNL.”
“Chevy loves to say the thing you’re not supposed to say — to the extreme,” he told David Spade and Dana Carvey on their “Fly on the Wall” podcast in December 2024.
“I have an example for you… So Chevy comes in to watch the movie, and he is there with [his wife] Jayni, and they watch the film, and he’s in the group, and he comes up to me after, and he pats me on the shoulder and goes, ‘Well, you should be embarrassed.’”
“What an exact Chevy thing,” Spade, 61, responded. “You couldn’t even write it better.”
Reitman took the criticism in stride.
“I’m trying to balance it because, in my head, I know, ‘All right, I’m getting a Chevy Chase moment that’s 1,000 percent only for me right now,’” he shared.
“And from a comedy point of view that’s really pure, and that’s kind of cool. But also, I just spent, like, two years of my life recreating this moment and trying to capture Chevy perfectly, and — even in the ego — find the humanity and give him a moment to be loved. And no, none of that s–t played. He’s not talking about that stuff.”
“I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not” debuts on Jan. 1 at 8 p.m. on CNN.
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