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Why Jim Carrey Almost Quit The Grinch & Gave Back $20 Million Salary<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Pucker up, Whoville\u2014the Grinch is coming back.<\/span><\/p>\n Indeed, director <\/span>Ron Howard<\/strong> and his producing partner <\/span>Brian Grazer<\/strong>\u2019s production company Imagine Entertainment confirmed on Instagram June 18 that a sequel to <\/span>Jim Carrey<\/strong><\/a>\u2019s 2000 movie <\/span>How the Grinch Stole Christmas<\/span><\/em> is in development.<\/span><\/p>\n The pair said Carrey will also be involved, and he\u2019s reportedly in talks to reprise the titular role in the <\/span>Dr. Seuss<\/strong> adaptation, according to <\/span>The Hollywood Reporter<\/span><\/em><\/a>. Meanwhile, Howard has signed on to direct the movie and will produce alongside Grazer, Plus, writers <\/span>Alec Berg<\/strong>, <\/span>Jeff Schaffer <\/strong>and<\/span> David Mandel<\/strong>\u2014who wrote the 2003 Seuss movie <\/span>The Cat in the Hat<\/span><\/em>\u2014will pen the script.<\/span><\/p>\n It\u2019s unclear if <\/span>Taylor Momsen<\/strong>\u2014who played Cindy Lou Who as a child before starring on <\/span>Gossip Girl<\/span><\/em>\u2014will return.<\/span><\/p>\n After its release in November 2000, the <\/span>Grinch <\/span><\/em>film became the highest grossing domestic movie of the year and earned the 2001 Oscar for Best Makeup.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n But while the Academy may have been pleased with Carrey\u2019s costuming as the green-haired menace of Whoville, the actor had quite a different experience.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \u201cThe suit was made of unnervingly itchy yak hair that drove me insane all day long,\u201d he told <\/span>Vulture<\/span><\/em><\/a> in December. \u201cI had ten-inch-long fingers, so I couldn\u2019t scratch myself or touch my face or do anything. I had teeth that I had to find a way to speak around, and I had full contact lenses that covered the entire eyeball, and I could only see a tiny tunnel in front of me.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Carrey\u2019s discomfort was so intense that he actually considered quitting the project. However, the production ended up hiring <\/span>Richard Marcinko<\/strong>, who the <\/span>Liar, Liar<\/span><\/em> actor described as \u201ca gentleman that trained CIA officers and special-ops people how to endure torture.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/span>Getty Images<\/span><\/p>\n<\/section>\n \u201cHe gave me a litany of things that I could do when I began to spiral,\u201d he explained. \u201cLike punch myself in the leg as hard as I can. Have a friend that I trust and punch him in the arm. Eat everything in sight.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n One piece of advice Carrey took was to \u201csmoke cigarettes as much as possible.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThere are pictures of me as the Grinch sitting in a director\u2019s chair with a long cigarette holder,\u201d he continued. \u201cI had to have the holder, because the yak hair would catch on fire if it got too close.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n As for how Carrey ultimately survived the filming process, though?<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cWhat really helped me through the makeup process, which they eventually pulled down to about three hours, was the <\/span>Bee Gees<\/strong>,\u201d he said. \u201cI listened through the makeup process to the entire Bee Gees catalogue. Their music is so joyful. I\u2019ve never met [creator] <\/span>Barry Gibb<\/strong>, but I want to thank him.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n While awaiting more details about the sequel to <\/span>How the Grinch Stole Christmas<\/span><\/em>, read on to learn secrets about the 2000 film.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/span>Francois Duhamel\/Universal Pictures\/THA\/Shutterstock<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div> They Put a Grinch on the Moon<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n Jim Carrey<\/strong><\/a> infamously went full method<\/a> to play late comedian Andy Kaufman\u00a0<\/strong>in the 1999 biopic Man on the Moon<\/em>.<\/p>\n Which, since filming on How the Grinch Stole Christmas<\/em>\u00a0got underway that same year, resulted in some overlap for the star of both films.<\/p>\n “Jim Carrey<\/span> didn’t exist at that time,” the actor told an audience at the 2017 Venice Film Festival, which hosted the premiere of the documentary Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond \u2013 The Story of Jim\u00a0Carrey<\/span>\u00a0& Andy Kaufman Featuring a Very Special, Contractually Obligated Mention of Tony Clifton<\/em>. “Andy actually affected the Grinch\u00a0as well.”<\/p>\n Namely, Carrey said he spent two hours on the phone with Howard one night going over notes, but in character as Andy.<\/p>\n “It was psychotic at times,” he admitted.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n <\/span>Kevin Winter\/Getty Images<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div> I Will Try to Entertain You as Best I Can<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n Carrey even met with Theodore Geisel<\/strong>‘s\u2014aka How the Grinch Stole Christmas <\/em>author Dr. Seuss<\/strong>‘\u2014widow Audrey<\/strong> Geisel <\/strong>as Kaufman, according to director Ron Howard<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n Audrey being the gatekeeper of her late husband’s legacy and the one to say yea or nay to the project.<\/p>\n But apparently she appreciated Carrey’s commitment to both characters.<\/p>\n “He invited Mrs. Geisel to the set,” Howard told Empire <\/em>in 2000,\u00a0“and for a while he was talking to her like Andy Kaufman. And then he’d drop that and turn back to her and be the Grinch for a whole minute of Grinchiness, including the big grin, and she was totally enthralled. By the time I came to her with my idea, she said to me, ‘I love it, and I want Jim Carrey to play the Grinch.’ Which is what I wanted to hear because I probably wouldn’t have done the movie with anyone else.”<\/p>\n And it was only the beginning, as Carrey also voiced Horton in the 2008 animated hit\u00a0Horton Hears a Who!<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n <\/span>Blue Sky\/20th Century Fox\/Kobal\/Shutterstock<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div> The Seussian Cinematic Universe<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n You can’t tell when you’re\u00a0in\u00a0<\/em>Whoville (or on<\/em> it), but the whole planet fits on a speck of dust, according to Dr. Seuss’ 1954 book\u00a0Horton Hears a Who!<\/em><\/p>\n And yes, according to Seuss canon lore,\u00a0the microscopic Whos Horton hears are from the <\/em>Whoville of\u00a0How the Grinch Stole Christmas\u00a0<\/em>fame.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n <\/span>Universal\/Getty Images<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div> A Sweet Gesture<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n Taylor Momsen<\/strong><\/a>, who was 7 when she played Cindy Lou Who, would bring Carrey candy bars from his native Canada.<\/p>\n And he, in turn, told people that she “used to give him too much candy,” so if he forgot his lines it was because he was “all hyped up” from the sugar, the Gossip Girl<\/a> <\/em>actress told E! in 2000. “That’s just a funny story that he tells.”<\/p>\n Meanwhile, though she remembered bringing him toffees and couldn’t remember the name of the chocolate bar he said was his favorite, Carrey recalled being awash in his preferred confection.<\/p>\n “She was buying me Crunchies, which was my favorite Canadian chocolate bar,” he told E!, “so she was plying me with Crunchies all the time.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n <\/span>Robin Platzer\/Twin Images\/Online USA, Inc.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div> Liking the Sound Of It<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n Momsen said working with Oscar-winning Titanic<\/em><\/a> composer James Horner<\/strong><\/a> on Cindy Lou’s songs made her realize she wanted to make music<\/a> more than anything.<\/p>\n “I’ll never forget walking into this beautiful studio, with this immaculate console in front of me,” the Pretty Reckless<\/strong> frontwoman<\/a> said on <\/a>TODAY<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>in 2020, “and putting headphones on and singing into a microphone for the first time, singing ‘Where Are You, Christmas?’ That was such an impactful moment in my life because it made me go, ‘I wanna make music for the rest of my life. I love being in a recording studio.'”<\/p>\n Performing the tune on set, Momsen said, “essentially, that was my first music video.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n <\/span>Melinda Sue Gordon\/Imagine Ent\/Kobal\/Shutterstock<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div> Wicked Coincidence<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n “We all knew we were part of something really special,” Carrey told E!, recalling how every time he walked on set, he’d “just go, ‘Come on, this is insane<\/em>.'”<\/p>\n He explained, “I felt like I was part of The Wizard of Oz<\/em><\/a>. I was just like, ‘I wonder if they were thinking those things when they did that movie,\u2019 because I was always amazed at what they came up with.”<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Momsen did her communing with the 1939 Judy Garland<\/strong><\/a> classic before she came to set.<\/p>\n “I like all that imagination,” she said. “I used to walk around the house dressed up as Dorothy or pretending I was Glinda.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n <\/span>Imagine Ent\/Kobal\/Shutterstock The True Meaning of Makeup<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n Grinch-designated makeup artist Kazu Hiro<\/strong>‘s first design was deemed too<\/em> transformative by the studio, which wanted Carey to be more recognizable, so he was asked to dial it back.<\/p>\nEntertainment <\/p>\n
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