It would be the network's first since the October 1988 cancellation of The Late Show, originally hosted by Joan Rivers and later by Arsenio Hall and Ross Shafer.

[4] Fox spent $1 million to renovate the Aquarius Theater, the Los Angeles venue where the show would be recorded.

The show's set featured a tank with live fish (visible during interviews), basketball hoops, and shelves of toys,[5] as well as a desk with a built-in piano.

The program's lead-in featured a clay-animated Chase stealing letters from notable Los Angeles landmarks to spell the name of his show.

"[7] The magazine criticized Chase for having "recycled old material shamelessly," taking pratfalls, and even pleading with the audience to stand up and dance in their seats.

[9][10] By contrast, Late Show with David Letterman guaranteed fewer than four million viewers to their advertisers.

[9] Lucie Salhany, the then-chairwoman of Fox Broadcasting, announced on October 17, 1993, that the network had decided to cancel the show "in the best interests of both its affiliated stations and its star".

"[1][9] Chase issued a statement regarding the cancellation, in which he called the talk-show format "very constraining" and promoted his upcoming film, Cops and Robbersons.

Fox ran reruns of In Living Color in the former time slot of The Chevy Chase Show after the cancellation.