Chevy Chase had 'full meltdown' after on-set incident leaked

Chevy Chase had a "full meltdown" after his on-set use of the N-word was leaked to the media.

A former director of Community has opened up about the events that led to Chevy's 2012 departure from the popular sitcom.

In a new, authorised documentary about Chevy's life, Jay Chandrasekhar, 57, described how he "was there, directing, the night that Chevy Chase got fired from Community".

Jay recalled that Chevy, 82, had "said something" to co-star Yvette Nicole Brown, 54, that led her to leave the set.

"I know that there was a history between (the actors) around race, and she got up and stormed out of there," he said in the documentary, titled I'm Chevy Chase and You're Not.

"Chevy storms off, so the producer is like, 'We need Yvette in the scene, right?' I'm like, 'Yeah, she's in the next scene.' And he goes, 'Well, she won't come out unless Chevy apologises to her'."

However Chevy, he said, refused to back down and say sorry, arguing he had often called his Saturday Night Live co-star Richard Pryor "the N-word" without a problem.

"He goes, 'You know, me and Richard Pryor, I used to call Richard Pryor the N-word, and he used to call me The Honky, and we loved each other,'" Jay said.

"And I'm like, 'I know, man, I love that bit.' I said, 'You know, can we just have a little apology?' He goes, 'For what?'"

The next day, Jay said, news of the "racial incident" appeared in The Hollywood Reporter - triggering Chevy to undergo a "full meltdown".

He remembered the comedian "storming onto the set, and he goes, 'Who f***ed me over?' ... 'My career is ruined! I'm ruined!' Like, it's a full meltdown. 'F**k all of you!'"

Jay added the "meltdown" marked Chevy's last day on Community.

"He never ended up coming back after that," he said.