It’s clear that things are less than cool, cool, cool, cool, between former Community star Chevy Chase and the production team. After all, he left the NBC sitcom before Season 4 shooting wrapped and has publicly criticized the show countless times. Apparently, the cast was pretty happy to see him go though; Joel McHale, who plays Jeff on the show, recently revealed the comedian used to get physical with him on a regular basis.
“[Chase] would just try to fight me,” McHale told America’s Got Talent judge Howard Stern during an appearance on his radio show Wednesday. “He physically wanted to fight me.”
During other talk show visits, McHale has spoken of on-set accidents involving himself and Chase — McHale told David Letterman he separated Chase’s shoulder while shooting a boxing sequence — but he has never spoken of Chase having intent to hurt him before.
While chatting with Stern, McHale also confirmed that, as per many a rumour, Chase did use a racial slur while shooting a scene with African American actors Yvette Nicole Brown and Donald Glover.
“He was protesting his character’s racism,” McHale explained. “But he had also said in the past that Richard Pryor said it was OK for him to call him that [term].
“You shouldn’t be throwing that around on set … When he said it, I was like, ‘We are now at Defcon 1.’”
Both Chase and McHale appear in Community’s Season 4 premiere, which finally hits Citytv and NBC Thursday, Feb. 7 at 8 p.m. ET. Chase’s character, crotchety and pervy senior student Pierce Hawthorne, is set to appear in the majority of this season’s episodes, save for two.
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Community airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. ET on City and NBC.
