I hope you're sitting down: a clip from Chevy Chase's stinkbomb talk show

[RandomKoolzip]

http://www.panopticist.com/archives/192.html

In 1993, some very dumb Fox executives had a very very dumb idea: Let's give an over-the-hill hack comedian his own late-night talk show! And let's do it right at the peak of the talk show wars, when the competition will be even fiercer than usual!

The stink bomb that was The Chevy Chase Show first wafted over the airwaves on September 7, 1993, a week after David Letterman's CBS debut and a week before Conan O'Brien took over as the host of Late Night. If you blinked—or if you were rubbing your eyes because you couldn't quite believe the awfulness of what you were seeing—then you missed it: The show was cancelled after only five weeks. The end came when the show was ambushed by a Murdoch-funded black-ops team whose members hung Chase upside down from a par can before riddling his sad, humor-free body with automatic weapons. As the stagehands were mopping the blood off the floor and picking up all the tiny bits of Chase's flesh and brain matter, I turned to my companion and said, "This is the only funny thing that has ever happened on this show." I was almost sorry to see him go.

I watched The Chevy Chase Show that first night, and the scar on my chin is still healing. Everything about the show screamed "Unprepared! Unwise! Uncomfortable!" Chase was unprepared, the producers were unprepared, the writers were unprepared. Chase twitched so much that he almost transformed himself from a solid into a gas. The four-minute clip below contains part of Chase's interview with the show's first-ever guest, Goldie Hawn, as well as their truly unfortunate attempts to get the audience dancing—to "La Bamba"—as the show went to commercial break. Sandwiched in between is a humiliating episode involving a birthday cake and Hawn's then-adolescent son, Oliver Hudson, who was sitting in the front row of the audience. Notice that Chase can't even be bothered to put his heart into the obviously planned pratfall with the cake.


THis is some ugly shit, daddy. I warn you all: watch this on an empty stomach.

[no name no slogan]

1. WOW... you've got cojones to dig this thing up

Chevy Chase is possibly the most unfunny man alive. How he ever got a career out of it is a great mystery.

[RandomKoolzip]

2. He was great on the first season of SNL.

Plus, his work with the National Lampoon Radio Hour and their album "Lemmings" was also top-drawer. And, up until 1987 or so, he was a gifted comedic actor in admittedly minor films.

But since then....wow. He makes Judge Reinhold seem like a paragon of edginess.

I actually remember seeing an episode of this show back in 1993. Of course, I was higher than a blimp at the time, so my memory can't be trusted, but I didn't recall it being THIS disatrous.

[_testify_]

5. He was funny in Caddyshack.

and SNL. That's about it. Nice Judge Reinhold reference!

[peekaloo]

3. My favorite Chase as an unfunny asshole moment was his appearance

on 'Politically Incorrect' where he accused Steven Bocho (sp) of making crap TV. Turned into an insult fest and SB got the better of him.....don't remember if he stormed off the set but he definitely pouted and made a complete ass of himself.

[RandomKoolzip]

6. After "Funny Farm," after "Man of the House," after

"Nothing But Trouble," after those Dorito's commercials, and especially after his straight-from-hell talk show, Chevy Chase accusing ANYONE of making bad TV is unintentionally laughable, which is okay for Chevy, since unintentional laughs are the only ones he gets these days.

[underpants]

4. There is no such thing as a bad Goldie Hawn clip

and yes I am including "Bird on a Wire"

YUM!:P

[RandomKoolzip]

7. Goldie's "MILF" years ended in 1998 or so.

Her daughter has taken hold of their "hotness" operation beautifully, IMO.

[underpants]

8. NO!

Stop it

[RandomKoolzip]

10. Yes.

Plus, there's the whole image of her porking Tango (or is it Cash?) for all those years. Would YOU want to be in an orifice that you knew Kurt "Captain Ron" Russell had recently been diddling? My god in heaven, think of the diseases!

Like I said, Kate Hudson's a better bet these days. (IMO. Sure she's plooking that skanky sausage from the Black Crowes, but...)

[TreasonousBastard]

9. Saw the Friar's roast of Chase a while back...

and Colbert ripped him a huge new one in a beautiful screed.

Some kid new in the business said something like "Yes, we share anonymity, career mistakes, unfunnmy jokes, and the lack of work, but I'm just starting out..."

Much hilarity over Chase's lack of hilarity.

FWIW, I liked the "Vacation" flicks, but I think it was in spite of Chase, not because of him.

[RandomKoolzip]

11. Chevy's always been a good sport when he's on the receiving end

of derision. Hell, he went to bat for Michael O'Donoghue long after the bitter break-up of their writing partnership, even asking Lorne Michaels if he could deliver a O'Donoghue-penned monologue on an episode of SNL he was guest-hosting that was a total rip on his lame career, a mockery of his "selling out."

He's still about as funny as a one-legged dog, though.

[patcox2]

12. I just love anyone who can dedicate themselves to hating Chevy

Or any other entertainment figure, genre, or phenomenon. I do love it.

Now I happen to hate Jiminy Glick. I don't get it. I have never ever in my life thought Martin Short was funny, and the Glick show was the worst thing Comedy Central ever put on, and they were relentless in promoting its awfulness. For some reason, I get the impresssion lots of celebrities love Short, and it was an in-joke or something. There he was, replaying daily a lame ass bit first aired in a movie 20 years ago when his character was supposedly stung by a bee and swole-up, as they say in the south.

[RandomKoolzip]

13. You talk as if there's some sort of expenditure of energy involved.

[patcox2]

14. Don't let coolness imply that there isn't.

You have wit and intelligence and your dislike of Chase is based on advanced, knowledgeable critique, criticism as practiced by a cultural critic, as opposed to a simple unreflective subjective prejudice, and thats why I love it.