This sweet movie prop “Uncle Al” was screened used in the movie
“Ace Ventura – When Nature Calls”
Jim Carrey went over the waterfall on that wooden raft and when he came up out of the water he sees this huge alligator laying half in the water and half on the bank. He grabs this alligator by the tail and pulls him into the water.
You can see this scene in the short video below.
(Please be patience… video may take a moment to load)
I am not exactly sure where Uncle went right after filming but here is what I’ve found of his travels…
Star Wares, a well known prop dealer in California, had him for awhile and sold him to a museum in Texas. He spent several years hanging in the museum and then was sold to prop dealer Bruce Hubbard of Minnesota. Bruce uncrated him enough to get a few pictures of him to post on his website and left him in storage for several years.
Bruce and I are good friends and I wanted Uncle so we worked out a deal and I had him shipped to me. Uncle Al was now free… no hanging from a ceiling… no staying in a wooden crate…. free to take up a huge space in our garage!!!
After I had him for a year or so, I received and email and then a phone call from a producer from The Discovery Channel. They were doing a new show called Pop Nation which was kinda something like the Antique Road Show. They were going to 6 cities across the country to shoot their first season. They found my website Hollywood Prop Collector where Uncle Al was listed. They thought he would be awesome to have on their show. We talked and they said he would be the main attraction for the episode we would be appearing in!
We were originally supposed to go to Maryland to shoot our episode but couldn’t get a trailer in time so we had to wait a few weeks and go to their second shooting location which was Austin, Texas! We loaded him up and headed out. They as us to call them when we were close to them so they could have a camera crew outside to film us pulling up to the venue.
The studio paid $30,000.00 to have this custom made!
It is almost 17′ long, about 4 ‘ wide and about 3’ tall!
The body starts off being made of a square tubing aluminum frame. It is wrapped with several layers of 1″ thick soft cushion foam. The tail is made of solid soft cushion foam and head is molded from soft cushion foam too. The outer layer of foam has all the details cut into it then the outer layer was covered in latex and painted. We were told the eyes were made of ping pong balls! I am not sure what the teeth were made of but they seem to be made from a solid hard plastic.
Inside the end of a tail they installed a 1/2″ round steel rod which is what Jim Carrey grabbed a hold of to pull Uncle Al into the water with.