This was a rare incident where the fire extinguisher came before the firing.
Comedy vet Jim Belushi is opening up about a workplace dispute — to put it lightly — that got him let go from his role on “Saturday Night Live.”
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Belushi, 67, told Vulture about the years he worked on the show and some of the outlandish behavior that made him infamously hard to work with while he was on the show between 1983 and 1985 — including when he got fired for throwing a fire extinguisher at one of the show’s executive producers.
"Very simple: I was out of control," he said when asked why he was fired.
"It was the best thing to ever happen to me. I was out of my mind. I was throwing a fire extinguisher at Dick Ebersol, a hissy fit. ‘SNL’ is the hardest thing I ever did, and that’s including divorce. I survived it, barely. I went back to him with my tail between my legs. I drop the ego, I got humble. I stopped drinking the rest of that season."
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Belushi recalled how the producer gave him a little tough live — but admitted that, in retrospect, that’s exactly what he needed.
"Dick put me in my place, rightfully, and had the courage to do it. I came back; I begged [him] for forgiveness, and he put me on probation," Belushi told the outlet. "My wife at the time said, ‘You thrive on probation. You were on probation from freshman to senior year of high school. You operate better with boundaries.’"
Belushi was eventually hired back, but was soon let off after longtime producer Lorne Michaels returned to the show following a brief hiatus.
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