Chevy Chase was an abused child

[buttmunch]

April 23, 2007 -- CHEVY Chase has made us laugh since his first routines on "Saturday Night Live" in 1975, but behind the clownish façade are horrific memories of a childhood of beatings and psychological torture by a mentally ill mom and twisted stepdad.

"I lived in fear all the time - deathly fear," Chase says in a new authorized biography, "I'm Chevy Chase . . . And You're Not," by Rena Fruchter, out next month from Virgin Books. It reveals that Chase's concert-pianist mother, Cathalene, was a "very unhappy woman" who suffered from depression and panic attacks that could set her off at a moment's notice. They had her locking young Chevy in a closet for hours at a time and waking him up in the middle of the night to slap him "continually and hard, across the face," Chase tells the author. "I don't remember what it was for, or what I had done."

One of her other brutal punishments was to whip Chase over a period of days. "She would say to me, 'Ten lashes on the backs of your legs every day for a week at 5 p.m.' How can you hold on to that kind of anger against your kid?" Chase relates to Fruchter. "I knew I was a 'bad boy,' but I didn't know that everybody wasn't punished the same way I was."

Chase's younger half-brother, John, tells the author: "My mother, at her worst, was like an unleashed animal. It was at her hands, in her feral states, that Chevy suffered the darkest of his secret torments."

Chase was also traumatized by his mom's second husband, John Cederquist, who heaped on him "emotional and physical abuse that sometimes bordered on torture," Fruchter writes.

The comic, who starred in such flicks as "Caddyshack" and "National Lampoon's Vacation," is 63 now, and his tormentors are dead. But, he tells Fruchter, "I always turn to it in my mind . . . I'll never forgive them. At their graves I didn't. It was too hard for me. You would think a grown man could shake it off, as the coffin was being lowered, to say, 'I forgive you.' I don't forgive."http://www.nypost.com/seven/04232007/gossip/pagesix/pagesix.htm

This makes me sad to hear. I love Chevy Chase and forgive him for that crap talk show he tried to launch. Why are parents such shits to kids?

[doriangray]

awful to think but i don't think i've known or heard of one comedian who had a healthy childhood. most needy people on the planet.

[buttmunch]

True enough. But isn't Jack Black from a normal family? Or as normal as it could be with rocket scientist parents.

**edit: ok, I googled 'did all comedians have bad childhoods?' and this was suggested by our good friend google:

Did you mean: did all canadians have bad childhoods?

Hahahahaha...made me think of Grimm

[yanna]

What about Canadian comedians? Paging Jim Carrey and Mike Myers.

Sounds like Chase had it pretty bad. I think it's even worse when it's the mother who abuses her kids

[buttmunch]

I'm under the impression that both Carrey and Myers had fairly normal childhoods but who knows. I mean, Chevy Chase is in his 60's and is only now talking about this. And do you really think it's worse when the mother does it? I'm not sure...I think it would suck either way, but curious as to why you are of that opinion.

[pinklilycat]

Oh no, how sad . It says allot about his integrity that he didn't make this public until they had passed - they didn't deserve that courtesy but he's a good man for doing it.

[yanna]

Well, it's not a scientific opinion or anything, just that a guy i know who suffered abuse in the hands of his mother said it was way worse because people didn't believe him.

I don't really know if it is worse or better, each case is different and at least when it comes with boys, assuming they survive the abuse, there will be a time where they will be physically stronger than their mother. That's something. Also sexual abuse is less likely with women.

[buttmunch]

^^People didn't believe him? That's horrible, but then I'm always reading about people thinking kids make shit up and usually they don't. I was just curious, by the way. I'm always interested in theories on these subjects, for some strange reason.

[McJag]

That would have been off the charts for anxiety producing. There would be no way to escape it. Horrible.
This is what puzzles me: Do these abusers think these children never grow up? They do, and I am glad when they turn on the abuser. How are they hoping to get way with this & never have to face an adult child now bigger than they are. How could he forgive this from the people he should have been able to trust the most. Outrageous.

[louiswinthorpe111]

Originally Posted by buttmunch

I'm under the impression that both Carrey and Myers had fairly normal childhoods but who knows. I mean, Chevy Chase is in his 60's and is only now talking about this. And do you really think it's worse when the mother does it? I'm not sure...I think it would suck either way, but curious as to why you are of that opinion.

Jim Carrey has commented that he was dirt poor growing up. Homeless for some stretches of time, so I don't think he's was that great, either.

[celeb_2006]

Is he making a movie?

[buttmunch]

I guess I'd consider dirt poor and even homeless in a different category than being beaten and tortured by your certifiable parents (hmmm...that sounded snippy, but wasn't meant to). I mean, it seems like being poor has become somethign of a crime these days but to me, that's just life. What Chevy went through is something else all together. I wonder why he's talking about it now?

[Just Kill Me]

Some of the funniest people have screwed up lives; if you can't laugh about things you'll eventually just blow your brains out... a few have done that, eh?

[louiswinthorpe111]

Originally Posted by buttmunch

I guess I'd consider dirt poor and even homeless in a different category than being beaten and tortured by your certifiable parents (hmmm...that sounded snippy, but wasn't meant to). I mean, it seems like being poor has become somethign of a crime these days but to me, that's just life. What Chevy went through is something else all together. I wonder why he's talking about it now?

I was just making reference that Jim Carrey didn't have a "normal" childhood.
I'm not equating physical abuse with homelessness, but both can have a great and devasting impact on a child, just in different ways. I am not downplaying Chase's abuse.

[buttmunch]

^^I know...I couldn't figure out how to write what I wanted to say without it coming across as not accusatory. But I do often wonder why being poor is now considered so bloody horrible. Remember when working class intellectuals were considered super cool?