Chris Farley is widely considered one of the most iconic “Saturday Night Live” cast members of all time, but “SNL” creator Lorne Michaels wouldn’t always allow him on the set of the prolific late-night sketch show.
During a recent appearance on Dax Shepard’s “Armchair Expert” podcast (via Entertainment Weekly), Susan Morrison, the author of “Lorne: The Man Who Invented Saturday Night Live,” said that Michaels cracked down on the cast’s alcohol and drug use after John Belushi died from an overdose in 1982.
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“When Belushi died, it really hit him hard,” Morrison explained. “And I think he felt like this whole approach of just letting people do their own thing on their own time, this was the wrong approach. We’re a tribe, we’re a group, and we have to look out for each other.”
This approach extended to Farley, who “clearly had addiction issues” at the time, according to Morrison. Michaels would reportedly “call him into his office” and help him deal “the drinking or the drugs.”
Morrison added that after talking to Bob Odenkirk, who wrote on “SNL” from 1987 to 1991, she learned that Farley was often excited to get called into Michaels’ office, although the conversations were never easy.
“It was like the kind of thrill of being in the principal’s office, but at the same time, you’re getting in trouble,” she recalled. “He couldn’t metabolize it, but Lorne had really changed his approach. He would ban Farley from the show for weeks at a time if he was too fucked up. And he sent him to a series of really tough love rehab places. And obviously, it didn’t do it for him.”
“After getting clean once and relapsing, he’d been suspended by Michaels, who sent him to a tough-love rehab facility in Alabama,” she added. “Michaels knew that the show was what Farley liked best, so taking it away from him, he hoped, would make an impression.”
On Dec. 18, 1997, Farley died of an overdose from a mixture of cocaine and heroin, the same cocktail of drugs that killed Belushi 15 years prior. The “Tommy Boy” star died just two months after he returned to host “Saturday Night Live.”
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