STACK Magazine November Issue 121

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“To understand me, you need to
understand Texan logic.”
Born and raised in the Lone Star State
(Ulvade and Longview, respectively),
Matthew David McConaughey initially
intended to become a criminal defence
lawyer but ultimately wound up playing
one in a movie. After spending a year
in Australia as a Rotary exchange
student at the age of 18, he graduated
from the University of Texas at Austin
College of Communication in 1993 with
a Bachelor’s degree in Radio-Television-
Film. According to McConaughey, his first
acting gigs saw him “picking up $1,500
here and there from commercials. I did a
commercial for Miller Lite and made like
$6,000 – and that was huge!”Following a
memorable debut in Dazed and Confused
(1993), several supporting roles playing
characters like “Guy #2” and “Rental
Truck Guy”, and a breakout performance
in A Time to Kill (1996), audiences – in
particular the female demographic – fell
in love with this handsome, tanned Texan
and his Southern drawl. “Hollywood is
a pleasant place, when you are hip to
the game and you enjoy it for what it is
really,” he says. “It’s important to realise
that fame is a dance, and I’d like to think
I’ve got my dance down better now.”
The ‘90s
“My life is the road, man. I need
to keep moving.”
A meeting with casting director and producer Don
Phillips resulted in Matthew McConaughey landing
the role of ‘toolie’ DavidWooderson in Richard
Linklater’s cult comedy Dazed and Confused (1993).
He made an immediate impression, adopting his
character’s catchphrase “Alright, alright, alright!” and
life philosophy, “Just Keep Livin”, as his own.
His first LA audition was for Disney film Angels in
the Outfield (1994), in which he appeared alongside
fellow newcomer Adrien Brody. “I was getting
$48,500 just to act and play baseball,” the rookie star
noted at the time. “I thought I was rolling in dough.”
McConaughey is just one of many Hollywood
stars who have a horror film skeleton in their closet.
His is TheTexas Chainsaw Next
Generation (1994), a dubious honour he shares
with Renée Zellweger, who played a potential victim.
His agent reportedly pressured the studio not to
release the film theatrically, fearful it would damage
his client’s imminent star status, and following a
major hullabaloo, the movie was shelved until its
eventual video release in 1997.
Boys on the Side (1995) did for McConaughey
what Thelma & Louise did for Brad Pitt – introduced
a new Hollywood heartthrob in a chick flick road
movie, with the actor providing a love interest
for Drew Barrymore.
He next appeared (via flashback) as a sheriff with a
dark secret in John Sayles’ terrific crime drama Lone
Star (1996), before landing the breakthrough lead role
that would make him a household name and an object
of desire for a legion of female fans.
McConaughey may have abandoned legal studies
at uni, but he still got his day in court playing a defence
attorney in ATime to Kill (1996), based on John
Grisham’s racially charged best-seller. He received
the endorsement of Grisham, who was “happy we
were able to find a kid like McConaughey”, and the
MTV Award for Best Breakthrough Performance. “The
From a penchant for rom-coms and an aversion to
shirts, to a career revival and an Academy Award.
Friday before it came out, you could have shown my
picture to 100 people and asked if they knew who I
was and you’d have gotten 99 no’s and one yes”, the
actor recalled. “And the next week, it flipped in the
opposite direction.” McConaughey had ‘arrived’.
With his star power percolating following ATime to
Kill, it seems appropriate that McConaughey followed
it with a film called LargerThan Life (1996) – a
comedy starring Bill Murray and an elephant.
He then worked with two high profile Hollywood
directors, appearing as a property lawyer in
Steven Spielberg’s Amistad (1997) and a Christian
philosopher in Robert Zemeckis’s Contact (1997).
His next film reunited him with Richard Linklater
for the period crime drama The Newton Boys (1998),
based on the exploits of the eponymousTexas bank
robbers during the 1920s.
McConaughey was perfectly cast as the
slacker whose life becomes a realityTV show in
Ron Howard’s Edtv (1999), which also marked the
beginning of a long-term friendship with co-star
Woody Harrelson, or as he puts it: “My good man
Woody Harrelson, man. Whatever it is, we turn each
other on. We really have a comfort with each
other. Always good value withWood-man.
Classic, classic wild man.”
The ‘00s
“I personally don’t like to go see romantic
comedies. But people do want to see them,
and they seem to want to see me in them.”
In U-571 (2000), director Jonathan Mostow’s
historically inaccurate WWII adventure,
McConaughey found himself aboard the titular
German submarine along with Bill Paxton, Bon Jovi
and an Enigma code machine.
TheWedding Planner (2001) may have made
money, but in hindsight it was a bad move for
the actor. But who could have predicted that this
seemingly harmless J.Lo rom-com would be catalytic
in sending its hunky leading man down the road to
typecasting hell?
028 NOVEMBER 2014 JB HI-FI
FEATURE
“Alright, alright, alright!”
Dazed and Confused (1993)
EXTRAS
MATTHEW
McConaughey