James Eugene Carrey was born on January 17, 1962 in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada. He is the youngest of 4 siblings. He has a brother named John and two sisters named Pat and Rita. His parents are the late Kathleen and Percey Carrey. As a young child, Jim would lock himself in his room for hours, making facial expressions in his mirror, immitating many celebrities like Clint Eastwood and many others. He was also the comedian in the family. He got his comic side from his father.
While Jim was growing up, his father lost his job as an accountant. The family struggled to keep money and food in the house. Jim and his siblings worked in a factory, a job that they all hated, to help support the family. Due to the hours at the factory, Jim had to drop out of high school in the 9th grade. Things unfortunately got worse; the family quit their job at the factory. This led to the family to live in a tent on Jim's sister's lawn.
As Jim got older, he entertained his family with his comedy routine. He went to night clubs and performed stand-up. At his first try, he got booed off the stage. Jim refused to go back to stand-up for two years. During that time, he practiced his imitations and worked very hard to improve his act. After two years, he went back to the clubs and became a success. At that time, he met comedian Rodney Dangerfield. Rodney helped Jim's career as a stand-up. At 19, he moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career as a comedian. At that time, Jim wrote himself a check for $10 million dollars. Who would have thought that in the next few years, that check was payable to him? When his father died, Jim placed the check that he wrote to himself in his father's coffin.
Jim got his start on a short-lived T.V. show called The Duck Factory. The show was centered around a group of animators that worked on a cartoon where the main character was a duck. Jim got his first break into the movies with a role in his film debut, Finders Keepers. He then got other roles in movies such as Once Bitten co-starring Lauren Hutton, Peggy Sue Got Married co-starring Kathleen Turner and a young Nicolas Cage, and The Dead Pool co-starring Clint Eastwood.
Jim hit it big time when he was cast on the sketch-comedy show In Living Color He was mostly known as the only white male in the cast. Jim worked along side with Keenan Ivory Wayans, Damon Wayans, David Allen Grier, and many others. While on the show, he created wacky and memorable characters like Fire Marshall Bill.
Jim finally got the big Hollywood break he so longed for when he starred in Ace Ventura: Pet Detective along with Courtney Cox. The movie is about an animal detective who is on the search for a missing dolphin. The movie made $12 million dollars n its opening weekend. It was a box office hit. It made Jim an over night success. Next for Jim came movies such as The Mask with a then unknown Cameron Diaz, Dumb & Dumber, and many more after. Jim now commands $20 million dollars a picture, bringing him up there on the pay scale along with other $20 million dollar stars like Tom Cruise and Tom Hanks.
Throughout his career, Jim has won countless awards, including two Golden Globes: one for The Truman Show and one for Man On The Moon, where he portrayed the late comedian Andy Kaufman. Jim also has his hand prints at Man's Chinese Theatre in California. You can check out the awards he's won and have been nominated for by going to the awards section of this site.
Jim is twice-divorced: he was married for eight years to first wife Melissa Wormer, who was a cocktail waitress at the time. Jim and Melissa have one daughter, Jane. He was also married to actress Lauren Holly, his Dumb & Dumber co-star, for 10 months. Jim also dated Me, Myself and Irene co-star Renee Zellweger for quite some time. Jim is currently dating actress Jenny McCarthy.
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