10 Infamous Times Actors Refused To Break Character

Jim Carrey nabbed his second Golden Globe for Best Actor for his performance as legendary funny man Andy Kaufman in Milos Forman’s biopic Man on the Moon but the rather extreme lengths he took to get inside the mind of Kaufman didn’t exactly earn many new friends on set.

Carrey dove headlong into Kaufman’s quirky personality and stayed in character 24/7 during the shoot either as Kaufman himself or his vulgar alter ego, lounge singer Tony Clifton. His act was apparently so convincing and consistent that according to co-stars, crew and even Kaufman’s own family and friends it was difficult to tell where Kaufman ended and Carrey began.

Carrey’s commitment to ‘the Method’ even spawned a documentary – Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond – compiled from hours of behind-the-scenes footage that captured his on-set antics.

Alongside refusing to respond to any name but Andy or Tony, Carrey got up to some pretty bizarre stuff including barging into Steven Spielberg office demanding to see the shark from Jaws (as Tony Clifton) and speaking to Ron Howard about their forthcoming project How the Grinch Stole Christmas in character as Kaufman.

He took it a bit too far, however, when he picked a fight with wrestler Jerry Lawler – a friend of Kaufman’s who’d had a famously faux feud with him in the early 80s. While recreating a wrestling match between Lawler and Kaufman, Carrey tried to goad Lawler into hitting him for real by spitting on him to which the wrestler responded by putting him in a reverse chin lock and sending him to hospital.

Ouch, but understandable.