Behind-The-Scenes Details From 'Ace Ventura: Pet Detective'

Did you know Cannibal Corpse is the best-selling death metal group of all time? Despite the fact that countries like Germany, Russia, and Australia at one time or another banned sales of their albums and/or prohibited them from performing live shows, and politicians like Bob Dole have condemned them for "undermining the national character of the United States"?

But the band did have many fans. Among them was Jim Carrey - who was determined to have Cannibal Corpse appear in a cameo in Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. "We got a call from our record label, Metal Blade, saying that they’d got a call from Jim Carrey’s people saying that he wanted us to be in this movie he was making," Paul Mazurkiewicz, the band's drummer and co-founder, told Vice in 2015. "Of course, that’s not a call you’re expecting to get. It just didn’t compute, you know? But it was a phone call, simple as that."

The band liked the idea but worried they'd be portrayed in a comedic fashion. "We’re a brutal death metal band, and we’re serious about what we do. This seemed like it would be a cool opportunity, but we didn’t want to be made to look like fools or to be laughed at," the Cannibal Corpse drummer explained. "But they assured us that we were going to be portrayed as Cannibal Corpse - they weren’t gonna make fun of us."

They met Carrey for the first time on the film set. "They took us over to the [actors’] trailers, and Jim comes over to us wearing his Ace Ventura garb, going, 'Oh my god! Cannibal Corpse! It’s so great to have you guys here!'" Mazurkiewicz told Vice. "Then he starts rattling off lyrics and tells us he wants us to play 'Hammer Smashed Face.' It was insane." The drummer added, "He [Carrey] and Tom [Shadyac], the director, were so cool to us. They said, 'Whatever you guys want, let us know.' We were treated like kings. It was so crazy."

NFL Hall of Fame quarterback Dan Marino was determined to turn down an offer to appear in Ace Ventura: Pet Detective - until he met the film's star.

"He [Jim Carrey] came into this restaurant dressed like Ace Ventura, like the pet detective with the tutu and everything - running around and messing with people, all the stuff he does in the movie," Marino told fellow NFL QB Peyton Manning on a 2019 episode of the latter's Peyton's Favorite Players ESPN+ show.

How could Marino turn the role down after all that? 

"I was laughing my butt off the whole time," Marino admitted about his first meeting with the star. "I'm like: 'It can't hurt. I'll do it.'"

Ace Ventura: Pet Detective was Carrey's breakout film role - prior to the film's release in February 1994, the actor was known primarily as a stand-up comic and for his role on the ensemble sketch comedy show In Living Color.  In fact, the best-known member of the film's cast was generally thought to be the rapper Tone Loc, who'd had two Top 5 singles - "Wild Thing" and "Funky Cold Medina" - on the Billboard charts a few years earlier.

Tone Loc played Ace Ventura's police officer friend Emilio, and his song "Ace in the House" was featured in the film.

Jim Carrey, Tom Shadyac, and Jack Bernstein are the three credited screenwriters on this film. Originally, Ace Ventura was meant to be a generic private detective, rather than one who specialized in a specific type of case. Bernstein came up with the idea of making the character a pet detective after he saw David Letterman do a sketch on pet owners.

Ventura also had been originally written to be more of a bumbling Inspector Clouseau type. The character was rewritten after Carrey was cast.

Jim Carrey and Tom Shadyac are two of the credited screenwriters on this film.

According to Shadyac, some of Carrey's lines in the film like "Alrighty then!" and "Holy testicle Tuesday!" were attempts by the actor to try and come up with phrases that could potentially become hugely popular catchphrases - and some of them did.

Ace Ventura: Pet Detective was Jim Carrey's breakout film role.

In an interview with Inside the Actors Studio, Carrey revealed he based the character of the pet detective on an intelligent species of bird: "A cockatiel or parakeet of some kind... Everything was based on a bird, even the hairstyle."