{"id":1531,"date":"2009-01-08T14:53:35","date_gmt":"2009-01-08T13:53:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/blog\/?p=1531"},"modified":"2015-03-26T15:24:13","modified_gmt":"2015-03-26T15:24:13","slug":"jim-carrey-pays-tribute-to-my-friend-blackie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/?p=1531","title":{"rendered":"‘Yes Man’ Jim Carrey pays tribute to my friend Blackie"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Jim+Carrey+Zooey+Deschanel+Premiere+Warner+h-USHyzjT5tl\"<\/a>By Ray Bennett<\/p>\n

It was great to see that Jim Carrey still pays tribute to my late friend Bruce Blackadar for helping the Canadian comedian break into the big time. At a London press conference for his new film “Yes Man”, I mentioned that I had seen Carrey perform at Toronto’s Yuk Yuks comedy club back when Bruce was writing about him.<\/p>\n

He took the time to explain to the UK entertainment press corps:<\/p>\n

“Yes, he was a huge help to me. His was one of the first big articles I ever got and of course it was in the Toronto Star, so it was a big deal. That was a very pivotal moment for me. It was the thing that catapulted me in Canada to being known nationally, so I really am grateful to him for that. He gave me a lot to live up to too. He said something like ‘He’ll be bigger than Richard Pryor in six months.’ I was crazy, I was like ‘Wha-at?’ ‘Johnny Carson hasn’t seen anything … ‘ It was really fun.”<\/p>\n

I spoke to Carrey afterwards and he hadn’t heard that Bruce, who started out with me at The Windsor Star, had died. I told him what a great friend Blackie had been as well as a great writer. “Well,” Carrey said. “You know nobody really dies.”<\/p>\n

\u201cYes Man\u201d, which co-stars Zooey Deschanel (pictured with Carrey), Bradley Cooper and Terence Stamp,\u00a0tells of\u00a0a man who decides to say yes to everything and the word from Hollywood is that Carrey\u2019s deal with Warner Bros. on the\u00a0movie \u00a0involved no upfront payment so that he could make very little or end up with \u00a375 million.<\/p>\n

No wonder Carrey said yes to every opportunity to promote the movie including a major junket in London for the UK premiere in December. Now in theatres, the film\u2019s DVD release is due in April.<\/p>\n

Not that the Canadian comic is a slacker when it comes to beating the drums for his films. He showed up on TV\u2019s \u201cAmerican Idol\u201d wearing an elephant hat to promote \u201cHorton Hears a Who!\u201d, which grossed $297 million worldwide this year.<\/p>\n

Critics haven\u2019t always admired his choices, but audiences still love him so that even his flops make money. \u201cFun With Dick and Jane\u201d garnered $202 million around the world in 2005 and while the serious \u201cEternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind\u201d made just $72.2 million, it had only a $20 million budget and won him critical praise plus BAFTA and Golden Globe nominations.<\/p>\n

When Carrey pulls out all the comedy stops in something like \u201cBruce Almighty\u201d in 2003, it scoops up $485 million. \u201cYes Man\u201d received warm early reviews and Carrey says it\u2019s an illusion that he\u2019s left his trademark comedy films behind.<\/p>\n

\"eternal<\/a><\/p>\n

He says, \u201cI just do whatever I\u2019m attracted to. The scripts find you when you\u2019re emotionally in the right place to do them. At the time of \u2018Eternal Sunshine\u2019 (pictured above with Kate Winslet), I was broken-hearted. The director Michel Gondry said, \u2018You look beautiful like this.\u2019 I said, \u2018But we don\u2019t shoot for a year.\u2019 He said: \u2018Then don\u2019t get well.\u2019 So I said, \u2018I\u2019m gonna try to have a good time but don\u2019t worry, I can open up the wound again\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

He says he took \u201cYes Man\u201d because of its optimism: \u201cI know what it\u2019s like to be a shut-in. With this movie, I wanted to put something good out into the world, something that makes people feel good. I hope there\u2019ll be a change in the paradigm from cynicism to faith in better things to come. People have said they left the theatre after this movie thinking about what they can say yes to.”<\/p>\n

In the film, Terence Stamp (pictured with Carrey below) plays the guru of positive thinking whose self-help classes lead Carrey\u2019s character to become a yes man. Carrey says he\u2019d always wanted to work with the British star, who is known as much for his colourful life and firm opinions as his acting: \u201cWe had conversations about gluten-free diets and about Brigitte Bardot. Not too bad. He\u2019s lived a life and he\u2019s an amazing actor. It\u2019s pretty hard to crack him but he has a nutty inside quality. There\u2019s madness in his eyes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"yes<\/a><\/p>\n

There are some who feel the same way about Carrey and he agrees that his career was not always a steady climb: \u201cI\u2019ve lived the dream. I\u2019m the luckiest guy in the world and I never forget that. I\u2019m living proof of positive thinking, and that faith is more important than talent. In those early days, there were so many times when I was up and down, had those little thrills and then was washed up. People would say, \u2018He\u2019s had his shot, it\u2019s over\u2019. But I never thought I was finished when people said I was finished.\u201d<\/p>\n

He still puts everything into his work and he broke three ribs doing a pratfall in a bar scene in \u201cYes Men\u201d, he says: \u201cHalf-way through the pratfall, I changed my mind. I\u2019ve done pratfalls all my life. I know how to do them. But I decided I wanted to get all four limbs up into the frame at the same time.”\u00a0He carried on and finished the scene: \u201cAll I cared about was how it looked.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also did a bungee jump off a bridge. For insurance purposes it had to be done on the last day of shooting but Carrey could not be talked out of it, although he said, \u201cMy sphincter was so tight I could have made a diamond. Shortly after that, DeBeers bought my ass.\u201d<\/p>\n

A version of this story\u00a0appeared in Cue Entertainment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Ray Bennett It was great to see that Jim Carrey still pays tribute to my late friend Bruce Blackadar for helping the Canadian comedian break into the big time. At a London press conference for his new film “Yes … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,6],"tags":[285,1743,412,698,3127,3128],"class_list":["post-1531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-film","category-interviews","tag-yes-man","tag-bradley-cooper","tag-bruce-blackadar","tag-jim-carrey","tag-terence-stamp","tag-zooey-deschanel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1531"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1531\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6123,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1531\/revisions\/6123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecliffedge.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}