Jerry Lawler Had A Contentious Relationship With Jim Carrey While Filming 'Man On The Moon'
While there's often plenty of gray area surrounding the real-life relationships between wrestlers, Jerry "The King" Lawler hasn't been shy about the legitimate beef he has with actor Jim Carrey.
Lawler, a WWE Hall of Famer who enjoyed a longtime commentary career after decades in the ring, has opened up in multiple interviews about his contentious working relationship with Carrey stemming from their time on the set of "Man on the Moon." Carrey starred as comedian Andy Kaufman in the 1999 biopic and channeled Kaufman's "method acting" approach while filming the movie, which partially focuses on the artist's relationship with Lawler back when the two performers shared a long-running feud.
Kaufman, a performance artist who rose to fame through his appearances on "Saturday Night Live" in 1975, turned his artistic eye to the world of professional wrestling where he began a feud with Lawler that often blurred the lines of reality. The pair's spat famously included an on-air fight during a taping of "Late Night With David Letterman," which many viewers thought was real. However, the WWE Hall of Famer told Steve Austin on his WWE interview show "Broken Skull Sessions" that he and Kaufman were friends, which was something Carrey didn't fully understand while filming "Man on the Moon."
"Jim Carrey went wrong with that," Lawler said, according to Metro. "He obviously thought we really didn't like each other."
Carey's Antics On Set
Not only did Carrey think Kaufman didn't like Lawler, he thought the artist absolutely hated him because of their public, on-screen feud. Lawler explained to Austin that "the very first time I saw [Carrey], we're walking on the set — I'm like a kid in a candy store, the kid from Memphis, I'm in Hollywood, on the set of Universal Studios. We're walking along and I'm looking around, walking over to this trailer and all of sudden I see this –- BAM! This big glass bottle of orange juice or something flying through the air, almost hits me, splashes all over, there's juice all over the place."
The wrestler said he looked over to see Carrey dressed as Kaufman, yelling out to him, "I'll get you, Lawler! I'll get you, Lawler!"
"And then he runs inside the trailer," Lawler remembered. "That was my first introduction to making a movie!"
Lawler has also told TMZ in the past that Carrey once spat in his face while channeling Kaufman, saying he believes Carrey "went a little overboard" with the Kaufman character. The two men apparently put the past behind them, however — on an episode of Lawler's "Dinner With The King" podcast, the longtime wrestler said that Carrey later mailed him a letter and said it was "an honor and an odyssey" to work alongside him on the film.