Martin Freeman slams Jim Carrey's 'Man On The Moon' method acting

Martin Freeman has slammed Jim Carrey over his method acting for Man On The Moon, calling it “narcissistic”.

Carrey played comedian Andy Kaufman in the 1999 film and in 2017 Netflix documentary Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond it was revealed that he didn’t break character during filming and insisted on being called “Andy”.

However, The Hobbit star Freeman clearly thought it was a bit over the top.

Sharing his thoughts on the Off Menu podcast, he said: “For me, and I'm genuinely sure Jim Carrey is a lovely and smart person, but it was the most self-aggrandising, selfish, f****** narcissistic b******* I have ever seen.

“The idea anything in our culture would celebrate that or support it is deranged, literally deranged.”

The actor went on: “I am a very lapsed Catholic but if you believe in transubstantiation, then you're going somewhere along the line of ‘I became the character.'

"No you didn't, you're not supposed to become the f****** character because you're supposed to be open to stuff than happens in real life because someone at some point is going to say ‘Cut’ and there's no point going, ‘What does cut mean because I'm Napoleon?’

"Shut up.”

Freeman, 49, said it was important to “keep grounded”.

“That's not to say you don't lose yourself for the time in between action and cut but I think the rest of it is absolutely pretentious nonsense,” he went on.

“It's highly amateurish. It's essentially an amateurish notion because for me it's not a professional attitude. Get the job done man, f****** do your work.”

Freeman also joked that Carrey should “have got fired”.

The actor said in his industry there were “cushty gigs” but that “there is such a thing as pushing it”.

“That’s what that Jim Carrey thing looks like to me. At the very, very end, he does or says something that sort of is pertaining to his Christ-like self-grandeur and makes me think at the very last second, is all this a wind up? Is this a joke?” he said.

“Because he is clearly a very funny person and he knows absolutely where 'funny' is all the time, but you sort of think, has he lost himself in this delusion of thinking he's a guru or a fakir, because a fair few people do. Because once you get to the top of the mountain, what you are you going to do then?”

Freeman added that he hoped Carrey was “joking”.