Clint Eastwood loved Dumb and Dumber’s toilet scene

Last Updated on May 22, 2024

“Go ahead, make my day.” And apparently Clint Eastwood’s day was made when he saw Dumb and Dumber, particularly the scene in which Jeff Daniels’ Harry struggles in hilarious fashion to overcome both a battle with laxatives and a toilet that won’t flush.

Jeff Daniels recalled that none other than Clint Eastwood approached him about that Dumb and Dumber moment, not just because it made him laugh but because he could relate. “Clint says to me, ‘I just saw ‘Dumb and Dumber’ and you know, the toilet scene? That happened to me.’ And then he tells a story about dating this woman that he really wanted to impress, but the shellfish hit him the wrong way from lunch.” Eastwood may not come off as a guy with such a crude sense of humor — or with one at all; this is, after all, the guy who made two movies with an orangutan companion — but evidently he can appreciate potty humor. Now we can’t help but wonder if he could nail that scene in fewer than three takes…

While the scene, which Daniels said entailed “porcelain gymnastics”, paid off and stands as one of Dumb and Dumber’s most outrageous scenes (in a movie with a lot of them), he wasn’t sure at the time if it would stick or not. “It’s one thing to read the toilet scene, but then the day comes and we’re actually going to do the toilet scene. I told Jim [Carrey] , ‘This is either the beginning of my career or the end of it.’ Jim, who is fearless, told me, ‘It’s going to be great. You’ve just got to go all the way with it.’”

As we know, Dumb and Dumber was one of three monster hits for Jim Carrey in 1994, but it also showed Jeff Daniels could nail comedy (of the most ridiculous variety) in a way we never quite expected. Surprisingly, Daniels never really approached comedies like this after except for the ill-advised 2014 sequel. But we’ll always have dumb and dumber — Harry and Lloyd, that is (or is it the other way around?).

Where does Dumb and Dumber rank in your list of funniest movies? What is the best scene in the comedy? Let us know below!