‘It’s Just Exploding’: Jim Carrey on His New Career as an Artist & Political Cartoonist

Every time you think you know Jim Carrey—the comedian who catapulted to fame in the ’90s with starring roles in Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, Dumb and Dumber, and The Mask—the actor goes and reinvents himself. In the late ’90s and aughts, he transitioned from rubber-faced comedian to serious actor, appearing in critically acclaimed films like The Truman Show and indie-favorite Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Now, Carrey has found yet another incarnation—as an artist and cutting political cartoonist who isn’t afraid to take aim at the Trump administration.

“I get to a certain point where people go, ‘Oh, my God, you’re really great. That’s what you are.’ And I go, ‘Nope. I’m something different,’” Carrey told Colin Stokes, associate cartoon editor of the New Yorker. “I want to constantly be fashioning the limbs to this avatar and I want to constantly be growing, so what happens is I get a lull in popularity a little bit, and I kind of go away and I learn a new thing.”

Carrey shocked the world last summer when he released a short documentary: ‘I Needed Colour’. For six years, he had been quietly devoting himself to a studio practice, painting and sculpting as a way of mending personal heartbreak after his split from actress Jenny McCarthy in 2010 after five years of dating.

“All pain becomes art. That’s the rule,” Carrey explained to Stokes. “Some horrible thing happens in your life. For me, I end up at the art studio.”

Of late, the horrible things inspiring Carrey have been largely political, and the actor has made numerous headlines with his political cartoons. Carrey had threatened to drop out of the New Yorker Festival after conservative political operative Steve Bannon was announced as the headliner, an appearance that was almost immediately canceled. Unsurprisingly, the actor-turned-artist didn’t shy away from the political at this weekend’s talk. He opened with a short song, making instrumental-like sounds. “This is a piece of music I wrote this afternoon,” he deadpanned. “Called ‘Requiem for the Supreme Court.’”

After multiple allegations of sexual misconduct, contentious hearings, and a limited FBI investigation into the claims, Judge Brett Kavanaugh had been confirmed by the Senate earlier that day. In response, Carrey had posted a new political cartoon praising Kavanaugh accuser Christine Blasey Ford on Twitter, encouraging voters to take to the polls to voice their opposition to the Senate’s decision.

“Are we going to get to see all those Confederate statues again?”Carrey asked the crowd. “What’s the positive there? Hanger sales go through the roof?”