Chevy Chase was born Cornelius Crane Chase on 8th October 1943 in New York. He inherited the nickname Chevy from his Grandmother with reference to the Maryland suburb of the same name while his middle name comes from his childhood holiday home, Crane Castle, in Massachusetts.

Chevy's school days were often interesting and he was expelled from both New York's private Dalton school and then from Haverford College for a prank which involved bringing a cow into the college block. He fared better at Bard College where he eventually graduated in 1967 with a B.A. in English. Chevy also used his time here to fuel his passion for music playing the drums in a band named The Leather Canary which included Donald Fagen and Walter Becker who ultimately formed Steely Dan. It was also at Bard where Chevy reportedly dated actress Blythe Danner, mother of Gwyneth Paltrow and star of films including Husbands and Wives, The Prince of Tides and Meet The Parents. Post-school days were Chevy's entry into the world of writing for other showbiz acts until he eventually got involved in Lorne Michaels National Lampoon's Lemmings stage show and Ken Shapiro's The Groove Tube collection of comedy sketches. While neither of these were particularly good they led to Lorne Michaels hiring Chevy as a writer for his new TV show Saturday Night Live. However, Chevy made the most of his chance to play a newsreader and as soon as he uttered the now immortal line "Good evening, I'm Chevy Chase and you're not" the world of comedy was changed forever. The success of SNL was phenomenal with Chevy himself winning Emmy awards for both his writing and acting in the show. Chevy only stayed for the first season and a few cameos thereafter but he had established himself as America's hottest comedy talent and decided to try his luck on the big stage in Hollywood.

Chevy moved to Los Angeles after SNL and married model Jacqueline Carlin in 1976 although this ended in divorce in 1980 shortly before Chevy sank into heavy depression.

The first real movie Chevy starred in was 1978's Foul Play with Goldie Hawn and while it proved a reasonable success Chevy really hit the big time with the cult classic Caddyshack a few years later. His performance as the smooth talking golfer Ty Webb with a quick-witted response for every question set a precedent for the style he would take with him through all of his later classic roles. The next few years Chevy churned out a few mostly poor films (although 1980's Seems Like Old Times still sits up well) until he found his calling in 1983's superb National Lampoon's Vacation. Playing Clark Griswold the ultimate family man, Chevy established himself as one of the funniest comedy actors in America.

In 1983 Chevy married again, this time to Jaynie Luke with whom he now has three daughters Cydney, Caley and Emily.

In 1985 Chevy found himself in the lead role of Fletch based on the award winning novels by Gregory Mcdonald. This film was not only a huge hit when it was released but is still one of the most played comedies on American cable TV today and the reason for this and many other web-site's existence. Irwin M. Fletcher continued the fast talking style of Ty Webb and created the most quoteable comedy of all time which has become a centrepiece of college drinking games on both sides of the pond. It was also in 1985 that Chevy reprised his role as Clark Griswold in National Lampoon's European Vacation which while poorer than it's predecessor still had some magical moments and performed moderately at the box office. A number of good quality comedies followed including Spies Like Us, Three Amigos and Funny Farm until Chevy had the misfortune to appear in the much maligned golfing sequel Caddyshack II. The original had created a cult following and the disappointment of this sequel led to it being considered one of the worst movies of all time. It is possibly due to the poor press this film received that the following year's Fletch Lives reprising Chevy's greatest ever role, met with bad press too.

At the height of his popularity Chevy had the honour of presenting both the 1986 Academy Awards (with Goldie Hawn and Paul Hogan) and then again the following year on his own. He also featured in the 1986 pop video for the song 'You Can Call Me Al' by close friend Paul Simon.

Chevy finished the decade off with another turn at Clark Griswold in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation which was well received and can be found in nearly every TV schedule come the Christmas period today. This though was the end of Chevy's dominance at the US Box Office and the nineties produced a number of flops including Nothing But Trouble, Memoirs of an Invisible Man, Cops and Robbersons and the final Vacation installment National Lampoon's Vegas Vacation. While these films flopped Chevy had been linked with other more successful films including lead roles in 'The Player' and 'American Beauty' but insisted he was more keen to star in family orientated films. In 1993 Chevy also tried his hand at presenting a talk show, The Chevy Chase Show, which flopped horrendously and was cancelled after just two months and things got worse when in 1995 Chevy was arrested for driving while drunk. The new century has seen Chevy continue with mainly cameo appearances in such films as Snow Day and Orange County although his name is often linked with new Fletch and Vacation sequels.