Steve Carell 'almost lost' a body part in 'bloody incident' filming iconic movie scene

We’ve all heard the grueling stories of actors getting injured on set.

They break a bone (ahem, Blake Lively), somehow survive a life-or-death stunt (Tom Cruise), slice open their hand (ahem, Leonardo DiCaprio), and yet they still manage to hold it down and get through the take. I mean, how could there ever be art without pain.

But somehow, in the face of all the horrifying stories you’ve probably heard before, this not-so fun anecdote from Steve Carell absolutely bulldozes through them all.

Whilst filming Judd Apatow’s cult comedy The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Carell was alarmingly close to losing a body part — and yes, you guessed it, it was during the waxing scene.

As its title so aptly suggests, The 40-Year-Old Virgin follows Andy Stitzer, a virgin who embarks on a mission to get laid with the help of his co-workers David (Paul Rudd), Jay (Romany Malco), and Cal (Seth Rogen).

In one scene, Andy and co. decide to get his chest waxed in hopes that it would make him more appealing to women.

Being the pro-actor that he is, Carell decided to actually get his chest waxed in this scene, forgoing the prosthetics for the real deal. Now, all this would have been fine, had the actress playing the waxing lady, Miki Mia, actually had previous experience in hair removal… but she didn’t. Not really.

This moment could have been the last for Carell's nipple. (Universal Pictures)

You see, when one waxes their chest, a protective layer of Vaseline needs to be applied to the nipples to avoid things like, I don’t know, ripping them off! Apparently, Mia didn’t do that and went straight to ripping things off right then and there.

Speaking to Heart radio, Carell reminisced on filming the iconic scene and shared, “I almost lost a nipple. That waxing scene on The 40-Year-Old Virgin, one take. For real, you can see blood! The pores were ripped open and you can really, really judge it by the way the other people in the scene are reacting.”

“They are freaking out that it’s actually happening in front of them,” he added. “The woman who did, [she] had on her resume that she was a professional waxing artist — and she’d never done it before!”

The cast were reacting in real-time. (Universal Pictures)

Now waxing in and of itself is already a painful experience, but to have your whole nipple ripped off while it’s happening?

We can’t even imagine the anguish.

So, the next time you watch The 40-Year-Old Virgin, remember all that Carell sacrificed to make it happen.

He’s easily giving DiCaprio a run for his money.

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