Chase voice mails no laughing matter

Updated: April 11, 2012 - 9:30 AM

FILE - Chevy Chase

Photo: Kristian Dowling, ASSOCIATED PRESS - AP

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Another voice mail from Chevy Chase, leaked online Tuesday, depicts a deep rift between the comedian and the creators of his ratings-challenged NBC sitcom "Community."

The show's creator, Dan Harmon, had previously apologized for playing voice mails at a comedy club that were left for him by Chase. A new one was released Tuesday by Celebuzz.com.

In it, Chase calls "Community" a "mediocre sitcom" that "is not my kind of comedy."

"It ain't funny to me because I'm 67 years old and I've been doing this a long time," Chase says. "I've been making a lot of people laugh, a lot better than this."

Although the recordings left on Harmon's phone appear to have taken place during the show's second season, they reveal just how bad things have been for Chase and "Community." The now-68-year-old "Fletch" and "National Lampoon" star was initially meant to be the most familiar face to the show, which has generally found critical acclaim and a cultish following. But the airing of such squabbles adds another challenge to "Community," whose current third season was postponed until midseason by NBC, and which faces an uphill battle for renewal. NBC and a representative for Chase declined to comment.

Harmon last week wrote a lengthy apology on his Tumblr page for what he called a "horrible, childish, self-obsessed, unaware, naive and unprofessional decision to play someone's voice mail to me."

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"Game of Thrones" is getting another season, HBO officially announced Tuesday. Although most people assumed the hit fantasy series would be back again -- it's been receiving great reviews and ratings -- its third season is now guaranteed. "Series creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss raised our expectations for the second season -- and then surpassed them," said Michael Lombardo, the president of HBO programming. If Benioff and Weiss follow the pattern they established in the first two seasons, then the third season of "Game of Thrones" will takes its story lines from the third book in George R.R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" series, titled "A Storm of Swords."

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