Chelsea Handler
Comedian Chelsea Handler, pictured Jan. 12, 2016, slammed her former friend Heather McDonald after she said she "lived in fear" when she worked for her. Getty Images

Former friends Chelsea Handler and Heather McDonald have entered a nasty feud. Handler hit back after McDonald said she “lived in fear” while working on E!’s late-night talk show "Chelsea Lately," which ended in August 2014 after 7 years on the air.

Handler, who know has a gig with Netflix, ranted during an interview with Jenny McCarthy on SiriusXM Radio. She was especially bitter about McDonald speaking out behind her back. "She would never say anything my face. She would only say that on the radio," Handler told McCarthy, according to Radar Online."She would never because she's f---king scared, and she should be. Now she should really be scared. What a loser.”

Handler, 40, said their friendship dissolved after McDonald exchanged information with Us Weekly. Instead of firing her from “Chelsea Lately,” Handler ended their friendship. "I could have fired her, but instead, I just stopped spending any personal time with her,” the TV host said. “Why the f--- would I tell somebody who's talking to a magazine about my career?"

McDonald didn’t mention the magazine when talking about why their relationship fizzled when she did an interview on the podcast “Allegedly with Theo Von & Matthew Cole Weiss.” She claimed it was “hard” never being promoted on the talk show. “If a new writer came on, they got the same thing as I did. That part bugged me,” she said.

McDonald was also sour about how the show ended. “She wasn’t happy doing the show at the end. Everybody saw. She had tired of it. She didn’t know how to get out of it, which is why she went on Howard Stern and ended it early for us, which screwed us,” McDonald said.

The writer and comedian added it’s great when someone is on Handler’s good side, but that Handler is fickle. “I think she’s really funny, and when you’re in your life and her friend, it’s the greatest thing … It’s the best thing ever. It’s so much fun. She laughs at you, and that’s what’s sad,” McDonald said. “She makes you feel so special until you’re not.”

“Chelsea Lately” ran on E! from 2007 to 2014. Handler ultimately got sick of the show. “They don't know what they're doing," she said on Howard Stern’s Sirius XM satellite radio show in March 2014. “They have no ideas. It's a failure.”

Her Netflix four-part docu-series, “Chelsea Does,” will be available Saturday, Jan. 23.

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