"I think it would have been a fascinating shoot and I?d love to do something like that with Joel at some point but it was more about the emotional place that I knew I would go. I just really didn?t want to feel that at the moment."

The part, which eventually went to relative unknown Colin Farrell, would have seen Carrey as a passerby who picks up a ringing payphone only to find that the anonymous caller has a rifle trained upon his back. Threatened with execution if he hangs up, the man must carry out the caller?s instructions out of fear for his life.

"What happens with me is I will thrust upon myself whatever I have to in order to get into the head of the movie I?m doing," says Carrey, "whether I?m trying to or not. So what started happening was I would lie in bed at night and end up thinking about somebody coming into my house and putting a gun to my head. I didn?t want to be the guy who?s got to sit for a couple of months and think about the feeling of "Oh my god I?m gonna die" and make it real for myself. These were things that I had to think and I had to feel to do the part but I didn?t want to go there at that time."

Having finished The Grinch and Me, Myself and Irene two very physically demanding roles, Carrey is looking for something a little more upbeat than Schumacher?s claustophobic thriller. "I felt that it just wasn?t right for me at that time, but that?s not to say that I won?t go there some time but I wasn?t in the mood this Summer, I was in love and just not ready for that."