‘I was just building something people would like, but Jim Carrey was a character’
Jim Carrey previously said he doesn’t feel like he ‘exists’ and has always “been a character.”
Whether it’s for his green transformation as the Grinch, his go at being God for a week, or his battle with a mask-based alter-ego, there is almost certainly at least one role you recognise Jim Carrey for.
One of the most successful actors of the last 30 years, Carrey has become known across the globe for his animated style, slapstick humour and energetic performances.
But whilst on screen he may be one of the funniest men in the business, away from the screen it seems that playing so many different roles and characters has sometimes taken a psychological toll on the Canadian.
In 2017, he opened up to TIFF about his career, saying that he saw himself as simply another character he’s played over the years.
He said: “I don’t exist, they’re all characters that I played, including Jim Carrey, including Joel Barish.
“They’re all characters. Jim Carrey was a less intentional character because I thought I was just building something people would like, but it was a character.
“I played the guy who was free from concern so that people who watched me would be free from concern.
“… Depression is your body saying ‘f**k you, I don’t want to be this character anymore, I don’t want to hold up this avatar you’ve created, it’s too much for me’.”
That same year, he told the media at New York Fashion Week: “There is no me. There are just things happening.”
He continued: “Here’s the thing. It’s not our world. We don’t matter. There’s the good news.”
The clip of his words went viral, and he later tried to explain what he had meant by them.
Speaking to The Wrap, Carrey said: “As an actor you play characters, and if you go deep enough into those characters, you realise your own character is pretty thin to begin with. You suddenly have this separation and go, ‘Who’s Jim Carrey? Oh, he doesn’t exist actually’.”
He continued: “There’s just a relative manifestation of consciousness appearing, and someone gave him a name, a religion, a nationality, and he clustered those together into something that’s supposed to be a personality, and it doesn’t actually exist. None of that stuff, if you drill down, is real.
“I believe I got famous so I could let go of fame, and it’s still happening, but not with me. I’m not a part of it anymore. Dressing happens, doing hair happens, interviewing happens, but it happens without me, without the idea of a ‘me.’ You know what I’m saying?
“It’s a weird little semantic jump, and it’s not that far, but it’s a universe apart from where most people are. I’m not the continuum. There’s no me. It’s just what’s happening. It’s not personal.”
