Beloved Saturday Night Live star Chris Kattan is now starring on Dancing With the Stars, and in the premiere episode he was told by the judges to not be so “stiff.” But as it turns out, he told reporters it was for a reason.

“I broke my neck and I had four surgeries regarding that, the last 20 years basically. One in my back, one through the throat… I had to be careful for a really long time,” he said. He went on to say that his injury was a result of a stunt. “When you have surgery, you’re out of commission for months. It’s embarrassing. You cant go out in public.”

However, his dance partner Witney Carson doesn’t seem to be bothered by his injury: “It’s definitely concerning because breaking your neck is a serious injury,” she said. “I’m a little scared, but I want to push him so the judges see that he is a contender. It’s a hard balance. The first two weeks [of rehearsal] have been a lot of test and trial to see what he’s capable of. But he’s fearless.”

Chris finally said yes after years of DWTS approaching him to compete. “They asked me twice,” he told People magazine. “At that time I wasn’t ready for it yet, physically. I had to be at the right level of health and spirit and all that. [Now] it’s perfect timing. I wouldn’t have been able to do this 5 or 10 years ago.”