Greenlights

When McConaughey returns to Hollywood, the William Morris Talent Agency signs him. The roles come easily to him; he gets roles in Boys on the Side and Angels in the Outfield, achieving the latter by virtue of having an All-American look and baseball experience.

After these two films, McConaughey obtains his own Malibu loft on the beach and starts taking acting classes, deciding he should learn some professional techniques to accompany his natural instincts. However, he finds that this makes him less spontaneous and daring in auditions, which results in fewer roles. When he finally lands a small role in Scorpion Spring, he decides not to read the whole script and throws himself into the role without over-intellectualization. He creates his own backstory for the drug runner he is playing and arrives on set already in character; his strategy backfires when he finds out the script is in Spanish. McConaughey concludes that acting involves an ideal balance where “we have to prepare for the job so we can be free to do the work” (Location 1593).

McConaughey plays a long game with view to landing the role of Jake Brigance in the movie A Time to Kill, based on a John Grisham novel. While the director initially prefers Woody Harrelson and is skeptical about casting a relative unknown in a lead role, McConaughey lands a special audition with Joel Schumacher two months later after he makes a bid for the role. His mother advises him “don’t walk in there like you want the role, Matthew, walk in there like you own it” (Location 1631). At first he gives an on-script audition but then he goes off script, believing his own work to the extent that he feels sick to the stomach with rage. The role makes him famous enough to be recognized in the street and to be offered far more scripts than he can take.

McConaughey retreats to the desert and confides in a monk named Brother Christian about the pressures of fame and not feeling truly like himself. Meanwhile, his mother has become so enamored with the idea of having a famous son that she goes on a confessional show called Hard Copy and takes the camera crew on a guided tour of the family home. This initially causes McConaughey’s relationship with his mother to become strained, but eventually he lets her share in his fame and red-carpet glamour and allows her to take credit for his aptitude for performance.

When the largely romantic comedy roles he is playing fail to present a challenge for him, he follows his wet-dream image of the Amazon River on a solo trip to Peru. He struggles with himself on the trail of this natural wonder before at last finding peace. He lives the image in his dream, floating naked down the Amazon River. He also has a vision of a mermaid, who will appear again later in the image of his wife.

On his return to Hollywood, McConaughey balances more philosophical roles with numerous hikes and canoe trips where he discovers the natural world. He takes his dog and they go on expeditions with his trailer.

McConaughey begins to find more satisfaction and inspiration from his travels and personal adventures than from his acting work. For example, he rents a house in Tarrytown, near Austin, Texas to have more space and privacy. He becomes infamous when he gets arrested for disturbing the peace while playing the bongos naked and smoking marijuana. This makes him a legend but also generates so much publicity that he has to leave Tarrytown.

Upon leaving Tarrytown, he takes up residence at the Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles, an exclusive hotel for celebrities. There he has multiple, ephemeral romantic relationships and lives a hard-partying lifestyle.

Professionally, McConaughey is offered multiple roles in romantic comedies, such as The Wedding Planner, How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days and Failure to Launch. Although he enjoys the opportunity to entertain audiences and transport them away from their drab lives, he finds these roles emasculating and feels they do not sufficiently challenge him.

He is thrilled to land the role of dragon slayer Denton Van Zan in the 2002 film Reign of Fire; he gets into the warrior spirit by shaving his head and enduring a punishing exercise and daredevil regime at his brother’s West Texas ranch at the height of summer. His regime incorporates wrestling cows in 108-degree heat and waking up to a shot of tequila. McConaughey goes to Ireland to shoot the role and, during filming, has the same wet dream he had years earlier that led him on his trip to the Amazon. This time he is captivated by the African drummers in the dream.

He follows the dream to Mali, where he goes to meet one of his favorite musicians, Ali Farka Touré. He then follows the advice of a man called Issa to go to a place where the Dogon people live. On the way, he has such experiences as camel-racing in the Sahara. McConaughey tells the Dogon people that he is a professional writer and boxer. As a result, a rumor spreads that he is a famous boxing champion and in a village called Begnemato, a man called Michael, the champion wrestler of his village, challenges him to a fight. Although he is intimidated, he agrees, knowing that he will regret it if he does not accept the challenge. At the end, the locals appreciate that he has participated and they accept him.

In contrast to his travels, he finds that acting is “nourishing my spirit less and less” (Location 2423). He senses that he needs to change track and buys a house in the Hollywood Hills that would fit a family of five.