'The Mask' Director Says He “Bet the Farm” on Jim Carrey Becoming a Movie Star [Exclusive]

Some actors have a star-making performance, but Jim Carrey had a star-making year in 1994. At that time, Carrey was already making noise thanks to In Living Color, but The Mask helped turn him into a full-blown movie star. For those of us who watched him step into that Edge City bank for the first time over 30 years ago, you could tell he had it. So, it seems, could director Chuck Russell.

Speaking with Collider for the 30th anniversary of Eraser for the latest edition of our retrospective series, Collider Rewind, Russell reflected on watching Carrey perform before casting him in The Mask. The filmmaker said seeing him live made it clear that Carrey’s physical comedy worked far beyond what he could do on television. “Yeah. So I’m at The Comedy Store, and I realized what he’d been doing in In Living Color, [which] I’d also been watching, was that he could do live," Russell told Collider. "I talked to him about it while we were filming The Mask, and he said, ‘If I can imagine it, Chuck, I can physically do it. It’s wild.’ He is a Charlie Chaplin. I knew, ‘This guy’s a comedy genius,’ literally. I bet the farm on Jim Carrey being a great movie star, and New Line finally agreed.”

Russell also revealed that Carrey was not the only major Hollywood discovery of the film. Cameron Diaz, who made her screen debut in The Mask, had never acted before, making the whole project a much bigger risk than it may look in hindsight, but boy, did it pay off. “The other person that I really saw ahead of time was Cameron Diaz, who had never acted before at all," said Russell. "So, the studio took quite a risk with me, and my encouragement on, first of all, letting that be a comedy instead of a horror film, which was originally how they conceived it, and letting me make it a vehicle for Jim and Cameron. It was kind of risk-reward. We made a movie that was unlike anything that had been seen prior.”

Originally, as Russell explained, the plan for the film was something more akin to a horror, which makes a lot of sense given the premise: Stanley Ipkiss puts on the mask and starts robbing banks and leaving bodies in his wake, then the next morning, he has no idea what crimes he's committed. But there was a very tricky tightrope to walk to make that into a comedy, and Russell pulled it off magnificently. “I wanted to make a literally joyful movie," Russell explained. "I’d lost my father not long before I got to make The Mask, and I just said, ‘I’m going to have a good time, and I’m going to make sure the audiences have a good time. Let’s get this movie made with Jim Carrey.’”

Your answers point to the world your instincts were built for. This is the universe your temperament, your survival instincts, and your particular brand of stubbornness were made for.

You took the red pill a long time ago — probably before anyone offered it to you. You're a systems thinker who can't help but notice the seams in things.

The wasteland doesn't reward the clever or the well-connected — it rewards those who are hard to kill and harder to break. That's you.

You'd survive here because you know how to exist in moral grey areas without losing yourself completely.

Arrakis is the most hostile environment in the known universe — and you are precisely the kind of person it rewards.

The galaxy far, far away is vast, loud, and in a constant state of violent political upheaval — and you wouldn't have it any other way.

The Mask was a massive success, especially considering how risky it looked on paper at the time, with two leads who were by no means household names, and visual effects galore. It was made for around $23 million and grossed about $351 million worldwide, which is an enormous return. Domestically, it made about $119 million, and internationally, it added around $232 million.

It was also a huge career-maker for Carrey and Diaz. Carrey had already broken out that same year with Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, but The Mask helped prove he could carry a big, effects-driven studio movie. When you watch Ace Ventura, there's a raw and low-budget feel to it. The Mask felt glossy and like a proper Hollywood picture, while Diaz's entrance into the Edge City bank is still one of the most memorable on-screen debuts in movie history. Critically, it landed well, too. The effects, Carrey’s performance, and the live-action cartoon feel were all praised, and the film earned an Oscar nomination for Best Visual Effects.

Stay tuned for more from our interview with Russell for the latest edition of Collider Rewind.