NEWS
Artistic Consultant Jim Carrey
20 Dec 2024 By Eva Araújo (Web correspondent)
"Sonic 3" has become a box office success! And we are very happy about it. Jeff Fowler, the director of all 3 movies has done an interview and because of it, we got to find out that Jim Carrey was credited as an "Artist Consultant".
Fowler never believed that Jim would retire:
"I never thought that for a second. Jim has too much fun playing this character. If we dangled a really great new idea for him to play with and explore as Robotnik, then I felt that he would be interested in coming back. "
"Jeff Fowler knew that the celebrated actor wouldn't be able to just turn that switch off, especially once Sonic 3's tantalizing dual roles of Ivo Robotnik and his grandfather, Gerald Robotnik, were presented to him. Thus, Carrey became more involved than ever before, putting his stamp on the character designs, character beats and improvisational dialogue. His impact was so significant that he received an additional credit on the film as "artistic consultant."
Jim also improvised a fourth wall-breaking moment where the Robotniks acknowledge that the same actor is playing both characters.
"How can you pass up the opportunity for a little wink at the audience? We all really loved the idea too, and it's also fun to acknowledge the Jim Carrey of it all in that scene."
Jim Carrey talked about retirement during the release of the second movie, so how worried were you that you wouldn't have him back for this third outing?
"I never bought that for a second. Jim has too much fun playing this character. If we dangled a really great new idea for him to play with and explore as Robotnik, then I felt that he would be interested in coming back. He's such an incredible talent, and all it really takes is the opportunity to explore new territory, such as giving Robotnik a grandfather and telling a family story from the Robotnik side of things. The first two films have very much focused on giving Sonic family and friends, and Jim certainly did all kinds of interesting things with the character in both of those films. But Sonic 3 was a new opportunity to show what Ivo's life would be like if suddenly he had a family."
Did you actually deliver him a script with gold ink? (Two years ago, Carrey quipped that his return would require the angelic delivery of a script that's written in gold ink.)
"I did, and it's now worth about a hundred thousand dollars, so, hopefully, Jim has got it locked up somewhere. It was a great early conversation about exploring the Robotnik family tree and designing Gerald, the grandfather, from the ground up. Jim had a lot of fun working with Mark Coulier, our makeup designer, to create Gerald's look. We would look at the sculpts together, and Jim would just have some little specific notes and ideas. As a director, I love that. I love when an actor is engaged and wants to help craft the character."
Is that why Jim is also credited as an "artistic consultant" on the film?
"That would be my guess, yes. We didn't want Gerald to feel like Jim Carrey with a gray mustache, a lab coat and a few wrinkles. We wanted it to feel like a unique character. There's a family resemblance, but we needed to go further. Jim really loves disappearing into characters and taking advantage of great prosthetics. I remember standing across from him when we filmed the camera test, and that's when everyone got their first look at what Mark had designed with the Gerald makeup. And it's one thing for things to hold up on film. Everybody knows you can get away with a lot more on film; the camera can be very forgiving. But to literally be standing there and looking at Jim in this makeup where every detail was just so lovingly crafted, it was movie magic."
Directing Jim in a dual role, was that quite the puzzle to piece together?
"Oh, absolutely. We all had ideas about it, but it had to work for Jim. We had a bunch of different pitches and plans, and every scene in the movie required a little something different just in terms of how it needed to be shot and what the nature of the interactions were. But we had to make such a big technical ask manageable for Jim. We then found Brendan Murphy, who's an amazing actor in the U.K. He was Jim's scene partner, and Jim would bounce the lines off of him. Brendan worked really hard to prep, and he would work with Jim on off days to rehearse each scene. So Brendan was just an incredible blessing because it was such a huge technical and creative challenge. But Jim made it look easy."
He's now played Robotnik more than Lloyd Christmas and Ace Ventura. This is the first time he's played a character for the third time on the big screen.
"I never take for granted the opportunity of getting to work with an incredible talent like Jim, and to have now made three films with him is incredible. I obviously grew up as a huge fan of his films and all those early iconic roles in The Mask, Ace Ventura and Dumb and Dumber. And it's just awesome to now have Robotnik in the mix and for there to be such an affinity for what he's done with this character."
Jim pitched Robotnik playing "leg guitar" to Pantera's "Walk" in Sonic 2. Was the Green Lantern reference another random flourish of his?
"It absolutely was. What I love most about Jim is that he always walks onto set with so many ideas, but he's still very much a collaborator. We always talk it through, and while not all ideas make it into the movie, it's the greatest blessing imaginable to have someone pitch so many ideas and be so engaged about finding the best version of the scene or the funniest version of the joke."
Jim really grew his hair long just for that quick montage where Stone shaves Robotnik's head?
"Well, I think he just grew it regardless of any plans to use it in the movie, so it fell into our lap. Jim moved out to the U.K. when we were getting into serious prep to begin principal photography, and we knew we needed to meet Robotnik at rock bottom. We knew we needed to see him wallowing in his dejection and sitting around in a dirty bathrobe and being surrounded by all this gross takeout food. So Jim had this long hair that he had been growing since the end of Sonic 2, and it was such a naturally perfect fit. So we made it really bushy and gnarly and gross, and visually, he could not have been further from the clean-cut, perfectly manicured Robotnik from the last film. It's just a great visual to start this third movie and to show how far he's fallen. The idea to shave the hair on camera was Jim's, and it was genius. It put a lot of pressure on Lee Majdoub, who plays Agent Stone. Everyone really felt for him because you're not getting more than one take of shaving somebody's head. But Lee really handled it in stride and did a great job. It's all on film."
We at JCO will keep you updated as more news come.
Source: Hollywood Reporter
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