History Creator / JimCarrey

* CanadaEh: Carrey was born in Newmarket, Ontario. He used to get annoyed with the same trite reaction people in Los Angeles gave whenever he mentioned where he was from ('Canada? Wow, must've been cold!'), but ultimately started playing along and giving [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ic3xNfEP_o this]] brilliant response.

* ''Film/{{Sonic the Hedgehog|2020}}'' (2020): [[Characters/SonicTheHedgehogFilmSeriesDrRobotnik Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik]]

** ''Film/SonicTheHedgehog3'' (2024)

Carrey has played many classic characters, and his involvement in a movie will often be a success -- so successful, any subsequent films and series usually suffer from his absence, as he rarely makes sequels to his own films. He developed a distaste for playing the same characters again and again on ''In Living Color''; the only reason he did the ''Ace Ventura'' sequel was due to contract reasons, and so thoroughly detested working on it that he openly declared he would never do a sequel again. In 1995, he even turned down a $10 million paycheck--which would have set a record, at the time, for the highest sum ever offered to a single actor--to reprise his role as Stanley Ipkiss in ''The Mask 2''. He held to this until 2014's ''Dumb and Dumber To'', re-teaming with Creator/JeffDaniels and the Farrelly brothers. (He ''was'' interested in reprising the role of Count Olaf for a sequel to 2004's ''Film/{{A Series of Unfortunate Events|2004}}'', but the film did not do well enough at the box office to warrant such.) He broke his rule again in 2022 by reprising his role of Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik for ''Film/{{Sonic the Hedgehog 2|2022}}''.

* [[SheCleansUpNicely He Cleans Up Nicely]]: Due to his smarmy, rubber-face persona, it is easy to forget that he is a tall, dashing man. It is more evident in his {{Dramedy}} and straight drama roles -- but it was also a factor in his being cast in ''Film/TheMask''. As director Charles Russell discusses on the Blu-Ray commentary track, he was familiar with Carrey's stand-up and sketch comedy work before seeing him on a talk show and, realizing how attractive he actually was, saw potential in casting him as a character who was both zany ''and'' a credible romantic lead.

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Carrey auditioned twice for ''SNL'' during the early-to-mid 1980s (first for Jean Doumanian's 1980-1981 season and again in 1985-1986 when Lorne Michaels came back after ''The New Show'' on ABC was a failure. The first time, Charles Rocket was chosen; the second time, Carrey was scared off by a man DrivenToSuicide and he was replaced with Randy Quaid).

* ''Film/{{Sonic the Hedgehog|2020}}'' (2020): [[[[Characters/SonicTheHedgehogFilmSeriesDrRobotnik Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik]]

Carrey has played many classic characters, and his involvement in a movie will often be a success -- so successful, any subsequent films and series usually suffer from his absence, as he rarely makes sequels to his own films. He developed a distaste for playing the same characters again and again on ''In Living Color''; the only reason he did the ''Ace Ventura'' sequel was due to contract reasons, and so thoroughly detested working on it that he openly declared he would never do a sequel again. In 1995, he even turned down a $10 million paycheck--which would have set a record, at the time, for the highest sum ever offered to a single actor--to reprise his role as Stanley Ipkiss in ''The Mask 2''. He held to this until 2014's ''Dumb and Dumber To'', re-teaming with Creator/JeffDaniels and the Farrelly brothers. (He ''was'' interested in reprising the role of Count Olaf for a sequel to 2004's ''Film/{{A Series of Unfortunate Events|2004}}'', but the film did not do well enough at the box office to warrant such.) He broke his rule again in 2022 by reprising his role of Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik for ''Film/SonicTheHedgehog2''.

* ''Film/{{Sonic the Hedgehog|2020}}'' (2020): Dr. Robotnik

* CareerResurrection: Carrey had a rough time of it in TheNewTens. His relationship with anti-autism pseudoscience promoter Jenny [=McCarthy=] was problematic to say the least, and then there was 2014's ''Film/DumbAndDumberTo'', the sequel to ''Film/DumbAndDumber''. Due to various legal issues surrounding that film against the crew responsible for making it, it was the end of Carrey's reign as a box office heavyweight (and he was the biggest for a time). For a few years he was mainly in small arthouse releases and direct-to-video fare, and doing controversial paintings critical of various right-wing political figures, including then-President UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump. He also suffered from depression, exacerbated by the suicide of an ex-girlfriend. Slowly but surely he recovered: ''Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond'', a documentary about his experiences on ''Film/ManOnTheMoon'', was acclaimed, he had a critical success with ''Series/{{Kidding}}'', and finally playing Dr. Robotnik in ''Film/SonicTheHedgehog2020'' gave him his first big movie -- and a hit at that -- in years. From there he not only had another hit with [[Film/SonicTheHedgehog2 the sequel]] but had success as a novelist with ''Memoirs and Misinformation'', went viral with his limited-time stint on ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' as Joe Biden, and appeared to great acclaim on Music/TheWeeknd's ''Dawn FM''.
* CanadaEh: Carrey was born in Newmarket, Ontario. He used to get annoyed with the same trite reaction people in Los Angeles gave whenever he mentioned where he was from (‘Canada? Wow, must’ve been cold!’), but ultimately started playing along and giving [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ic3xNfEP_o this]] brilliant response.
* CatchPhrase: Many, especially when he became an A-list star. ''WesternAnimation/CloseEnough'' did an entire episode ("The Canine Guy") invoking his most quotable films.

* ''Film/HowTheGrinchStoleChristmas'' (2000): The Grinch

Carrey launched his career as a comic in the late 1970s as a celebrity impressionist. He moved into acting in the mid-1980s, most notably in the short-lived sitcom ''The Duck Factory'', but -- after expanding his stage act beyond impressions by adding eccentric observational humor and commentary -- came to attention as a cast member on ''Series/InLivingColor''.

A colorful Canadian-born actor with a face for molding, James Eugene Carrey (born January 17, 1962) launched his career as a comic in the late 1970s as a celebrity impressionist. He moved into acting in the mid-1980s, most notably in the short-lived sitcom ''The Duck Factory'', but -- after expanding his stage act beyond impressions by adding eccentric observational humor and commentary -- came to attention as a cast member on ''Series/InLivingColor'' Serving as the cast's TokenWhite male, he more than managed to hold his own with several popular sketch characters, including mannish bodybuilder Vera [=DeMilo=], Fire Marshal Bill Burns -- a masochistic, cartoonishly destructive fire marshal hired to teach people fire safety (with disastrous results) whether or not he's somewhere where fire safety is needed -- and Grandpa Jack [=McGee=], the depressed, divorced, alcoholic host of ''The Dysfunctional Home Show''. Some notable celebrity impressions he did for the show include Creator/PaulReubens (as Pee-Wee Herman), Music/VanillaIce, Creator/TomHanks (in a parody of the movie ''Film/{{Philadelphia}}''), Sgt. Stacey Koon (from the infamous Rodney King beating trial in the early 1990s), UsefulNotes/GeorgeHWBush, UsefulNotes/BillClinton, and Music/MichaelBolton.

When the small-scale ''Film/AceVentura: Pet Detective'' arrived on movie screens in early 1994, it was roasted by critics but proved to be a surprisingly big hit. As it happened, he did two other hit movies that year (''Film/TheMask'' and ''Film/DumbAndDumber'') and was soon an A-list performer: the first big film comedy star of the 1990s, and ultimately the biggest.

He has played many classic characters, and his involvement in a movie will often be a success -- so successful, any subsequent films and series usually suffer from his absence, as he rarely makes sequels to his own films. He developed a distaste for playing the same characters again and again on ''Series/InLivingColor''; the only reason he did the ''Ace Ventura'' sequel was due to contract reasons, and so thoroughly detested working on it that he openly declared he would never do a sequel again. In 1995, he even turned down a $10 million paycheck--which would have set a record, at the time, for the highest sum ever offered to a single actor--to reprise his role as Stanley Ipkiss in ''The Mask 2''. He held to this until 2014's ''Dumb and Dumber To'', re-teaming with Creator/JeffDaniels and the Farrelly brothers. (He ''was'' interested in reprising the role of Count Olaf for a sequel to ''Film/{{A Series of Unfortunate Events|2004}}'', but the film did not do well enough at the box-office to warrant such.) He broke his rule again in 2022 by reprising his role of Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik for ''Film/SonicTheHedgehog2''.

Starting with ''Film/TheTrumanShow'' (at least as an A-lister), [[TomHanksSyndrome he's also appeared in more dramatic fare]], with ''Film/EternalSunshineOfTheSpotlessMind'' probably his most lauded serious role. Nowadays he's well-respected for his total acting range as in the Showtime {{Dramedy}} ''Series/{{Kidding}}'', which ran two seasons.

In his youth, Carrey's family struggled with poverty after his father Percy lost his job as an accountant; for a time they were even homeless. Nonetheless, his parents were supportive of his showbusiness ambitions (in part because Percy gave up a potential career as a saxophonist for the more "stable" accountancy job). In his early days performing standup comedy, Carrey reportedly wrote himself a check for almost $1 million and promised himself that he would, one day, be worth enough to legally cash it. That promise was fulfilled as his star rose in 1994; by ''Dumb and Dumber'' he had already earned several times more than the check itself was worth. When his father died that year, he put the check he wrote to himself in his father's casket.[[note]]Other stories contend he was more ambitious still, writing a ''$10 million'' check to himself when he was '''ten years old''', postdated 1995. Either way, that hope also came to pass as true![[/note]]