Feb 21, 2008 - When someone tells Jim Carrey to go jump off a bridge, the actor takes the order seriously. Or at least he does when it comes from director Peyton Reed and it’s for an important scene in the Warner Bros Pictures comedy, Yes Man. To mark the occasion of Carrey’s – literal – leap of faith, Warner Bros invited journalists to come to the set on the day of Carrey’s big jump.
Before the bungee jump Carrey reported he was feeling fine – and alive. Asked if he’s totally sure he wants to go through with the jump, Carrey replied, “Yeah, I'm totally sure, man. Affirmation of life, here we go. Yes Man, it's the perfect way to end the movie I think, just let go and let fly.”
“I'm feeling all of this. Just like in my regular life, I think just feel it all and you'll live it later,” explained Carrey. “So yeah, this, to me, a lot of people don't want me to say this but they call this Suicide Bridge because a lot of people make the ultimate choice here. But we're going to transform it today. Today it's Yes Man Bridge and it's where you say yes to life right here. So that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to transform this sucker. I'm going to spread love all over it like peanut butter on sourdough.”
After a quick request to pray for him and one last joke – “"That's one small step for man, one giant leap for comedy" - Carrey prepared himself mentally and physically and then took the dive. It’s over quickly and Carrey’s pleased with the experience. “That was incredible. That was wild. I loved it,” exclaimed Carrey.
Post-jump, Carrey said he’s always wanted to do crazy things in movies. “A lot of times they don't let me do it because of insurance things and all that stuff. Everybody's very careful about finishing productions. This was an opportunity for me to… I kind of like finagled my way into it. I told them, last day, get all principal photography out of the way and then we'll do it. For me, it's a metaphor. It's what the movie's about. It's about saying yes to life,” said Carrey.
Carrey’s got an easy answer when asked what went through his mind during the jump. “There was no mind really involved. It was just a total release, a total like, ‘Well, okay, I've had a good life.’ It's kind of that. I stopped, went, ‘Okay, let's do this.’ Your mind kind of detaches. I don't know. It's just so intense you can't describe it.”
Leading up to shooting, Carrey was feeling pretty good about tackling the scene. “You know, I felt pretty calm about it this morning. Then when I got up and stood there…but that is when it all became real. Wow. It's really hard to look down there from that place.”
Overall it was the concept of the movie – not this one particular stunt – which drew him to Yes Man. “Just the idea that if you say yes to things, you're generally better off than if you say no - most of the time. There are some things you shouldn't say yes to. There are some positions in yoga that I don't agree with at all, that I've regretted frankly when I'm in the middle of them,” joked Carrey.
For those who aren’t yet familiar with Yes Man, which is scheduled to hit theaters on December 19th, Carrey broke the story down into basics. “The story is about a guy who says no to everything and avoids relationships and avoids getting involved in life because he knows [about] the responsibility of life. So [he] just comes upon this class, this seminar that's about saying yes to things. He decides to say yes to everything in his life no matter what it is, and finds out that's not such a good idea either.”
Carrey’s description of the movie doesn’t sound like the film would be a real challenge physically, but Carrey did more action than just the bungee jumping scene. And getting physical on film sets is perfectly fine for the actor. “I generally do a lot of physical stuff during the movies. I'm constantly bruised from head to foot. Comedy's a brutal kind of thing because I do physical stuff a lot. It's tough to double because people kind of recognize me from the back, a certain posture or whatever way I move. Obviously, I don't do the most dangerous things. This is about the most dangerous thing I've ever done as a stunt,” said Carrey. “But one of the most dangerous things in this movie is just getting attacked by this dog. He comes flying at the end of a chain and was trained to do that, but they said, ‘He really will eat your face off if he gets off that thing.’”
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Yes Man is based on the book by Danny Wallace and directed by Peyton Reed. Yes Man will be released on December 19, 2008.
