Jim Carrey’s transformation into the Grinch for How the Grinch Stole Christmas is considered iconic, but behind the scenes, it was pure torture.
With this year marking the film’s 25th anniversary, director Ron Howard, Jim, special effects artist Rick Baker, and producer Brian Grazer chatted with Vulture about the movie’s legacy and the turmoil that occurred in the makeup chair.
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Ron shared how intense the experience was for the leading actor, revealing, “Jim started having panic attacks. I would see him lying down on the floor in between setups with a brown paper bag. Literally on the floor. He was miserable.”
The ordeal began almost immediately, with Jim recalling, “The first day in makeup took eight hours. And I went into the trailer and asked Ron and Brian to come in, and I told them that I wouldn’t be able to do the movie and I was quitting.”
The situation was so serious that he was ready and willing to give back his $20 million plus interest, if he could quit. But then Brian brought in Richard Marcinko, a trained expert on enduring torture who worked with CIA officers and special-ops people.
They told him if he worked with Richard over the weekend and still wanted to quit on Monday they would let him.
Jim revealed that the trainer gave him coping techniques, adding that what truly helped was music: “I listened through the makeup process to the entire Bee Gees catalogue.”
Despite shortened makeup times and schedule changes, Jim still wound up enduring 92 days in prosthetics. As the director put it, “It was remarkable,” noting Jim’s perfectionism even when exhausted. In the end, the result became a holiday classic but it came at a steep personal cost.
“There were a lot of things going on under that suit. It wasn’t a healthy situation, but movies are that way,” The Truman Show star said.
Jim recently reunited with his co-star Taylor Momsen (Cindy Lou Who) for the first time in 25 years!
