Matthew McConaughey is in Texas with his family, and will only come back to Hollywood on one condition.
The actor recently opened up about his decision to step away from Hollywood during a conversation with Australian tennis player Nick Kyrgios on the Good Trouble podcast.
The Oscar-winning actor revealed that he moved his family to Texas after the film industry resisted his efforts to break out of romantic comedies.
At the height of his career in the genre, McConaughey starred in box office hits such as The Wedding Planner, How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days, Failure To Launch, Fool’s Gold, and Ghosts of Girlfriends Past. Each of these films either exceeded or came close to earning $100 million worldwide, cementing his status as a romantic comedy icon.
Despite his success, McConaughey’s ambition to take on more diverse roles prompted a bold move, as he prioritised his artistic growth and personal life over remaining typecast in the industry.
“Look, man, the devil’s in the infinite yeses, not the nos,” McConaughey explained.
“‘No’ is just as important, if not more important. Especially if you have some level of success and access. ‘No’ becomes more important than ‘yes.’ Because, I mean, we can all look around and see we’ve over-leveraged our life with yeses and going, ‘Geez, oh man. I’m making C-minuses and all this shit in my life because I said yes to too many things.’”
“When I was rolling with the rom-coms, and I was the ‘rom-com dude,’ that was my lane and I liked that lane. That lane paid well, and it was working,” he continued.
“I was so strong in that lane that anything outside that lane – dramas and stuff that I want[ed] to do – were like, ‘No, no, no. No, McConaughey.’ Hollywood said, ’No, no, no. You should stay there.’ So, since I couldn’t do what I wanted to do, I stopped doing what I was doing, and I moved down to the ranch in Texas.”
After McConaughey shifted with his family to Texas, he made a promise with his wife. “I’m not going back to work unless I get offered roles I want to do,” he shared.