7 things to know about Matthew McConaughey

Matthew McConaughey remains one of the biggest movie stars in the world. The actor from Uvalde enjoyed early success in the 1990s, doing both mainstream money-making movies and more art house fare. A cluster of romantic comedies sidetracked him, but for years now, he’s enjoyed the freedom to pursue films that he wants to make. He has also diversified his doings. In 2000, he published a best-selling memoir, “Greenlights,” that told his story as a series of good and bad decisions in his life and career. That year his name began to surface as a potential political candidate. Interest in a Texas gubernatorial run ended last November. But McConaughey — a Texas native and a Texas resident — hasn’t ruled out a future run for public office. He has been particularly public recently, a Uvalde native who has responded passionately and compassionately to the Robb Elementary massacre that left 19 elementary school students and two teachers dead. 

McConaughey’s work is very public, and easy to access. Here are a few details about the greenlights and red lights that brought him to the present.

HIS CAREER ESSENTIALLY GOT STARTED IN A BAR

McConaughey had done some commercials and small-scale roles for TV by the early 1990s. He was dating a bartender working at the Hyatt in Austin. She got to know Don Phillips, a notable casting director who was in town working on a new film by Houston native Richard Linklater, whose “Slacker” was an independent film success. Phillips, who died in Nov. 2021, thought McConaughey so handsome that his initial reaction was to dislike the aspiring actor. But over drinks, the two bonded leading to McConaughey’s casting in Linklater’s “Dazed and Confused.”

“Don saw something in him,” said Melissa Maerz, author of the book “Alright, Alright, Alright: The Oral History of Richard Linklater’s ‘Dazed and Confused.’” He got Matthew an agent, taught him behind-the-scenes things about the industry. He made him in a way he didn’t other actors. We like to think of Matthew McConaughey as a great superstar from the beginning. That’s not really how it happened. There are so many micro connections that created McConaughey as a star.”

EVEN DURING AN EMBARRASSING PERSONAL MOMENT, HE BELIEVED IN ACCOUNTABILITY

Getting arrested for bothering neighbors while playing bongos stoned and naked isn’t the actual problem for a notable person. The PR of playing bongos stoned and naked is. Yet, McConaughey found himself in cuffs in 1999 for a naked celebratory moment. To his credit, he never tried to spin the event. It gets several pages in his memoir, “Greenlights,” where McConaughey says he was offered the opportunity to be ushered out of jail discreetly through a back door. He decided to walk out the front door instead. 

“Accountability,” he told the Chronicle, “is a great greenlight setter-upper.”

He views such moments as learning experiences.

HE’S NOT THE ONLY McCONAUGHEY TO DRAW ATTENTION

Jim McConaughey had some aspirations to play football beyond college. McConaughey’s father was a 27th round pick by the Green Bay Packers in the 1953 NFL draft. At 6’2” and 220 lbs., the University of Houston draftee never could play end in the 21st century. Turns out he didn’t quite get to play in the 1950s either. McConaughey instead started an oil pipe supply business. He and McConaughey’s mother, Mary, married three times. Their son Michael – a Houston native better known as Rooster – quit college and followed his father in the oil pipe business, before becoming a self-made millionaire investor and businessman. He’s appeared in a few TV shows including “West Texas Investors” and “Rooster & Butch.”

HE HAS KEPT A JOURNAL SINCE HE WAS A KID

McConaughey said his memoir benefitted from his commitment to documenting his life since childhood. “When I was 14, I went to it for the usual reasons anyone goes to a journal or diary,” he told the Chronicle. “You’re having trouble, your girlfriend broke up with you. ‘Why do I have pimples?’ In my early 20s, I was on a roll, though. I was catching greenlights. I realized I hadn’t written in my diary as much when things are going well. I remember thinking it’s a good practice to make sure you’re writing when things are going well, too. My hunch turned out to be true. You’re going to get off frequency in the future, run into some yellow and red lights. When things are going well, you think, ‘I’ll never forget this.’ But we do. . . . Having a diary meant I could look back on when things were lining up and rolling. What were my habits then? Who was I hanging out with? What was I eating and drinking? How much sleep was I getting? You can see the times the frequencies go off course.”

THE McCONAISSANCE STARTED WITH  WHAT HE THOUGHT WAS A RED LIGHT

McConaughey’s early career gave the appearance of being blessed: He could do art house fare like John Sayles’ “Lone Star” and star-making turns in bigger-budget films like “A Time to Kill.” But once he found his way to romantic comedies, the money flowed and the variety of offers stopped. He describes in the book an offer for an unnamed rom-com that would’ve paid $14 million. McConaughey turned it down and took more offbeat and challenging roles, saving his career.

“When money is involved,” he told the Houston Chronicle, “people aren’t always honest with you. They have an interest in doing the things that are working. I knew I needed to change something.”

SOMETIMES HE TAKES OFF WITH NO SET DESTINATION

McConaughey spent several years living in his 2004 Airstream trailer, mingling with folks at various RV parks around the country. Most of them had no idea he was a film star. He says he believes in the value of a fuga mundi, a meditative escape. Which is how he ended up with “Greenlights,” in which he documented the processes and learning experiences that brought him to the present.McConaughey said finding time for fuga mundi was simpler in his twenties. “It’s not as easy anymore with three children and a family,” he told the Chronicle. “Most of the ones I take in the book, I could get a hunch tonight and next morning put on a backpack and go.

“But writing the book was its own sort of walkabout.” He spent two weeks in the desert where he didn’t see anybody. He left the desert with a book that fits his approach to life.

“I’ve tried to call it an ‘approach book,’” he told the Chronicle. “I had fun finding that word. I was like, ‘Is it a lecture? Is it advice? … But I don’t like being told what to do.’ I didn’t like the idea of something so formal that it’s coming from the writer to the reader. Instead it prescribes …”

HE CONSIDERED RUNNING FOR PUBLIC OFFICE

McConaughey never became such a Hollywood fixture that he left Texas behind for good. Having spent his early years in Uvalde and Longview, he has always remained close to the state and these days lives in Austin. He enjoyed early acclaim and eventual ridicule for the films he made before the McConaissance of the past decade. But in 2000, McConaughey sounded like a guy who might run for public office, suggesting he was considering a gubernatorial run.

In Nov. 2021, though, he announced he would not be running for governor of Texas, though.

“It’s a humbling and inspiring path to ponder,” he said. “It’s also a path that I’m choosing not to take at this moment.” But if his book made clear one thing: McConaughey often finds ways to turn red lights into greenlights.