When Jim Carrey almost attacked a director

Each bad memory haunts him and leads him to spiral about what they truly had, with the film capturing the experience of only remembering the bad once the good has gone, struggling to make sense of what happened and how they got into such a mess.

It’s a beautiful and strange film that spans both ends of a relationship and the moments that marked it. While the story is very dream-like and otherworldly, this mood often came crashing back down during production as a result of the strained working relationship between Gondry and Carrey, with the pair once getting into an argument that nearly became physical.

The film is marked by scenes in which Carrey’s character ventures into his memories and becomes lost in the landscape of his own mind. He stumbles around exploring it to find traces of his ex-girlfriend before each moment they spent together is wiped from his brain through an elective procedure. In this process, he finds himself entangled in childhood memories as words, images and timelines blend and juxtapose, leading to strange scenes unfolding, such as the one where he and Winslet’s Clementine are being bathed by his mother in the kitchen sink.

While it is a light-hearted scene, the process of filming it was not easy due to Gondry’s use of practical effects, requiring both actors to sit in a giant sink of water for hours on end. This resulted in a slight creative conflict after Winslet almost fainted, and Gondry insisted they continue shooting, with Carrey becoming understandably incensed as he asked the director to let her have a break.

When discussing this, Carrey said, “People’s nerves get frayed. Michel was going, ‘Shoot, shoot!’ and she was going, ‘I’m nauseous’. And I got angry because she was not feeling well. So yeah, Michel and I had words.” Apparently, Carrey was so angry that Gondry even thought he was going to hurt him, asking the actor, “Are you going to punch me in the face?”

While a punch in the face might have gone a bit too far, you can understand the funnyman’s frustration over the scene, particularly if they were both becoming physically unwell from the strict demands of the shoot. The film saw the actors in a whole number of bizarre situations, whether it be lying in bed on a freezing beach or dressing up as toddlers. But no matter how great the story, there are some sequences that simply push you too far outside of your comfort zone, and for Carrey and Winslet, sitting in a cramped bathtub for four hours was what did it.

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