I'm Chevy Chase and You're Not was the signature intro line to his Weekend Update segments on the very first season of Saturday Night Live as well as this CNN Films documentary about the comedic actor born Cornelius Crane Chase. Recounting his life as a student at Bard College in the Sixties to becoming a writer-performer of the seminal National Lampoon Lemmings stage show to his being hired as a writer for SNL before slipping into the last cast slot and creating Weekend Update, the doc speed-runs through his career and life.
I have to admit to being not much of a fan of Chase and his oeuvre. Whether playing angrily smug in movies like Fletch or hysterically dumb (Vacation movies), I've never worn the "he's a comic genius" goggles most view him with and this doc doesn't really offer much of a counterpoint. If you think he's an a-hole, he lives down to that impression especially when he tries poorly to spin cruel comments he allegedly made towards Terry Sweeney, the first openly-gay cast member of SNL. Other times he claims to have no memory of antics due to a major health crisis he suffered a decade or so ago which had as a side effect memory impairment. Convenient.
Probably the only bits of new info I took from I'm Chevy Chase and You're Not was that when he bailed from SNL after its first season (clearing the way for the much funnier and versatile Bill Murray to replace him) it was just because Hollywood was calling and he wasn't under contract (whoops!), though that was part of it, but rather his then-girlfriend wanted to live in California. (Flying out for the wedding, former colleagues were betting on how long it'd last; they'd divorce in under a year.) With two failed marriages under his belt, the third time was the charm as he met his missus while making 1981's Under The Rainbow and they're still together with three daughters.
If you're more of a fan of Chase's schtick, you may enjoy this somewhat superficial documentary more than I did. Have at it.
Score: 6/10. Catch it on cable/streaming. (Currently on HBO Max)
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