It's strange to think that it was just earlier this year that the Weeknd thrust his masterful Dawn FM (one of Exclaim!'s 29 Best Albums of 2022 So Far, naturally) upon us. Something about that album makes it feel like it's been in the canon for a while, right?
Maybe it's the sense of purgatorial timelessness, which comes in part from Jim Carrey's radio broadcaster narration on the project — but the project almost wasn't tied together by the comedian's unmistakable honeyed drawl.
In a new interview with Entertainment Tonight, Carrey revealed that he initially rejected the Weeknd's proposition for him to appear on the album.
"He's an incredible guy," Carrey told interviewer Lauren Zima of his fellow Canadian, "an incredible artist and a lovely person, and I feel very lucky to be his friend."
Apparently, 1994's The Mask was the first movie the artist born Abel Tesfaye "ever saw" (which honestly checks out, since this writer definitely got a copy of that DVD from a cereal box at some point) and proved to be a big inspiration to his sick and twisted mind, which has recently conceived of the forthcoming HBO series The Idol alongside Euphoria's Sam Levinson.
"He put it to me that he was doing this thing that was the radio station in purgatory, and I didn't want to work," Carrey recalled of Tesfaye approaching him for Dawn FM, "and I was like, 'I love you, but I don't want to do any work.'" It seems like nobody wants to work these days.
Carrey further remembers Tesfaye nudging him with a reminder that he could just record the narration into his iPhone.
"And then I started waking up in the middle of the night — which is what happens with me, I play in the middle of the night — and I start spitting bars, of all things, for god's sake," the actor laughed.
Carrey added: "I said to him, 'Use nothing at all or use a line here and there, if you want to, but I don't have to be in it, whatever.' He said, 'No it's fire, you gotta do this,' and gave me a really beautiful place on the album, so I'm so gratified."
And the rest is history! Carrey went on to become the album's throughline, as well as leaving a lasting impression with the outro, "Phantom Regret by Jim." He and the Weekend shared another full-circle moment in the music video for "Out of Time," where the Sonic the Hedgehog 2 star trades in his talk-radio booth for a hospital, playing a surgeon of sorts — hey, there's even a mask!
Don't you dare touch that dial. Refresh your memory below.
The Weeknd recently teamed up with Summer Walker to remix a song from the album.
Maybe it's the sense of purgatorial timelessness, which comes in part from Jim Carrey's radio broadcaster narration on the project — but the project almost wasn't tied together by the comedian's unmistakable honeyed drawl.
In a new interview with Entertainment Tonight, Carrey revealed that he initially rejected the Weeknd's proposition for him to appear on the album.
"He's an incredible guy," Carrey told interviewer Lauren Zima of his fellow Canadian, "an incredible artist and a lovely person, and I feel very lucky to be his friend."
Apparently, 1994's The Mask was the first movie the artist born Abel Tesfaye "ever saw" (which honestly checks out, since this writer definitely got a copy of that DVD from a cereal box at some point) and proved to be a big inspiration to his sick and twisted mind, which has recently conceived of the forthcoming HBO series The Idol alongside Euphoria's Sam Levinson.
"He put it to me that he was doing this thing that was the radio station in purgatory, and I didn't want to work," Carrey recalled of Tesfaye approaching him for Dawn FM, "and I was like, 'I love you, but I don't want to do any work.'" It seems like nobody wants to work these days.
Carrey further remembers Tesfaye nudging him with a reminder that he could just record the narration into his iPhone.
"And then I started waking up in the middle of the night — which is what happens with me, I play in the middle of the night — and I start spitting bars, of all things, for god's sake," the actor laughed.
Carrey added: "I said to him, 'Use nothing at all or use a line here and there, if you want to, but I don't have to be in it, whatever.' He said, 'No it's fire, you gotta do this,' and gave me a really beautiful place on the album, so I'm so gratified."
And the rest is history! Carrey went on to become the album's throughline, as well as leaving a lasting impression with the outro, "Phantom Regret by Jim." He and the Weekend shared another full-circle moment in the music video for "Out of Time," where the Sonic the Hedgehog 2 star trades in his talk-radio booth for a hospital, playing a surgeon of sorts — hey, there's even a mask!
Don't you dare touch that dial. Refresh your memory below.
The Weeknd recently teamed up with Summer Walker to remix a song from the album.
