Donald Glover and Dan Harmon Say Chevy Chase Regularly Made Racist Jokes During ‘Community’ Filming

Chevy Chase has been called difficult to work with in the past, but a new profile on Donald Glover in The New Yorker (via SPIN) alleges the former “Saturday Night Live” star repeatedly made racist jokes to Glover while filming “Community.” According to the profile, which includes interviews with both Glover and “Community” creator Dan Harmon, Chase “often tried to disrupt” his scenes opposite Glover and made “racial cracks between takes,” one of which was the following: “People think you’re funnier because you’re black.”

“Chevy was the first to realize how immensely gifted Donald was, and the way he expressed his jealousy was to try to throw Donald off,” “Community” creator Dan Harmon told The New Yorker. “I remember apologizing to Donald after a particularly rough night of Chevy’s non-P.C. verbiage, and Donald said, ‘I don’t even worry about it.’”

Glover told the publication that he interpreted Chase’s racist cracks as the comedian “thrashing in the water” and didn’t take them too personally.

“I just saw Chevy as fighting time—a true artist has to be O.K. with his reign being over,” Glover said. “I can’t help him if he’s thrashing in the water. But I know there’s a human in there somewhere—he’s almost too human.”

Chase responded to Glover by saying he was “saddened to hear” he “perceived [him] in that light.” Glover starred on the NBC comedy series for five seasons before leaving to pursue other projects. Harmon continued the show for an additional season without Glover. The actor has gone on to create the award-winning FX series “Atlanta,” which returns for Season 2 on FX starting March 3.

Head over to The New Yorker for Glover’s full profile.