How Jim Carrey nearly ended up starring in the worst movie ever made
Jim Carrey’s career in the entertainment industry began in the 1980s, but it truly took off in the following decade, with the actor asserting his comedic chops with various appearances on the sketch show In Living Color. While some of the sketches might be retrospectively considered a little problematic, at the time, Carrey found widespread popularity on the show, and it helped him to go on to bigger cinematic projects, finding unprecedented success in 1994.
That year, he starred in The Mask and Dumb and Dumber, while also proving his screenwriting skills with Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, playing the private detective who specialises in finding animals. Carrey quickly became one of the most popular comedic figures in the industry, known for his exaggerated facial expressions and ability to seemingly shapeshift into different kinds of humorous characters.
The rest of the decade saw him move between comedic and more serious roles, impressing greatly with The Truman Show and Man on the Moon. Carrey truly is the embodiment of a star who won’t hesitate to strike a balance between lighthearted and serious parts, pulling both off incredibly well. From How the Grinch Stole Christmas to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Carrey has tried his hand at a wide range of genres, and this has seemed to ensure his success.
However, throughout his career as a leading man, he has narrowly missed out on certain roles, whether that be at his own discretion or due to a decision made by a producer. Carrey almost took leading parts in The Aviator, Elf, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and Chaplin, but none of these ended up working out. Perhaps the one he regrets missing out on the least, however, is The Master of Disguise, which he turned down.
The movie, directed by Perry Andelin Blake, saw Dana Carvey play Pistachio Disguisey, a man who goes undercover when his parents are kidnapped. Carvey, of Saturday Night Live fame, also wrote the screenplay with Harris Goldberg, but it was received overwhelmingly negatively. It seems as though Carrey was lucky to miss out on the part, which would’ve seen him appear alongside the likes of James Brolin, Jennifer Esposito, Brent Spiner, and Maria Canals.
The idea simply fell flat, and it didn’t help that Andelin Blake had no prior experience as a director – he evidently didn’t know what he was doing. The production designer never helmed another movie, even if he did manage to make a surprising gross of $43.4 million on the film.
American film critic Roger Ebert gave the movie just one star, explaining in his review: “The Master of Disguise pants and wheezes and hurls itself exhausted across the finish line after barely 65 minutes of movie, and then follows it with 15 minutes of end credits in an attempt to clock in as a feature film.” With a lack of substance and enough material to make the movie long enough, it seems as though Carrey would’ve been wasted on the project.
Instead, the actor worked on various other movies that year, signing onto Bruce Almighty, which was released the following year and ended up becoming one of the highest-grossing movies of 2003.
