Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
Listener, what are you doing? Are you driving? Are you walking? Are you jogging? Are you banging around on a subway looking at weird people and now you're listening to a weird person? Well, guess what? I'm sitting alone. I've got headphones on. And, you know, we're just in this weird space together while we're waiting for Sean and Will to get their crap together and grab a microphone.
Until then, I'm going to play a little music for you, a little robot music. All right, here we go. Welcome to Smartless. Will, you're back home. Will, you're back home. I'm back home. Um,
I'm feeling really good about it. You don't sound good. You sound a little bored and tired and not into the sesh today. We're having a sesh. We're having a pod sesh. Okay. Listener, singular by this point. Thank you for your support, listener, by the way. Yeah, we really appreciate you. You're really keeping this boat afloat. Yeah. Yeah.
Jason dropped sesh on the group chat. No, it was seshy. And he said seshy and then he went sesh and then he said it's super fun. It's short and fun for a session. I like that. And we all know it. We all know sesh. But of course, the bit is that nobody's ever used sesh.
Or Seshie. Sesh has been used, but I think I'm first probably on Earth with Seshie. Yeah. You might be. Are we talking about a new sweatshirt? You know what? A smart list with Seshie on it? The stupidest. Get in the Seshie, join the Seshie. That's a good idea. The stupidest short I have that I forget who gave it to me, but I will not stop it is Preach.
Oh, preach always. I won't stop preaching either. I love preach. It is the shittiest, douchiest. Like appreciate, you mean? Yeah, short for appreciate it. So if somebody does something, you go, ah, preach, dog.
Oh, God. It's so bad. You used to get so mad at me for shortening words. I love typing it too. Preach. Because I will put the little, what do you call it, hyphen there. Or no, what is it? The apostrophe. The brain shuts down after 3.30 for me and we're now at 4.08.
Yeah, I mean, we're pushing dangerously close to Gummyville. Gummy time. I mean, we're right on the outskirts of Gummyville. I don't do that for work, bro. I know, dude. I know. This is the end of my protein shake right there. I'm on the backside of a workout. I'm fresh. This is me peaking. God, this is your peak? I'm peaking. Look at the hair. Speaking of peak. Yeah.
My happiness is about to peak in, what is it, a week and a half, Sean? Yeah, because Sean's coming home. I'm so excited. I know, I feel the same way. You know what we did today? We packed boxes and we borrowed this old luggage carrier, you know, like a bellhop uses, to put the boxes on and walk them down the sidewalk to FedEx. You did. Where did you get one of the little push carts? There's one in the basement here in the building. In the building, of course. Yeah. Yeah.
But I mean, the sight of me and Scotty pushing this thing, sweating our ass off down the sidewalk. Yeah, it's like a bad opening credits to a sitcom. It totally is. It totally is. Wait, where was it, Sean? Where's the FedEx office? It's just a couple things over. It's a couple blocks over. Well, avenue or blocks? No, like blocks. But we wheeled it inside the store.
Sure. So we had the luggage carrier. I used to do that when I lived downtown. When I lived downtown in the lower, in, in, in,
In the West Village, there was a FedEx right on Leroy Street, and I lived, and I could come out the back of my building. Anyway, I would come a full, almost, you know, big, long block, and I'd go across the street with the thing into the FedEx. What kind of thing? Did you have, like, a little red wagon or something like that? No, the same thing, luggage cart from the building. You could hang stuff above. All the buildings have them in New York. You have to.
I didn't know that. I didn't even know he had one. Oh, man, you're going to love Planet Earth. Because how else are you supposed to get it there? Dude, you're going to love Planet Earth. I know you've been up to... Your head's been up in space hoping it's real, right? I asked for a dolly. Where are we at right now? Sean, where are we at right now with you with Alien...
Oh, my God. Because it feels like it's really come alive this summer. It's a bunch of people talking from the government now. It's 100% real. Are you going to Congress? Are you going to do any stuff like just going like, it's real, you guys. Is Scotty watching C-SPAN in the back room right now? And bring a gavel for no reason? Sean Hayes from television and film. Go ahead, Sean. It's real, you guys. All right? That's all I got to say. Guys and just a gavel. Everybody pay attention. So wait. They're like, why do you have a gavel? What?
Just to outgavel them. But did you see the press conference like a month or two ago where the guys like said basically, it was all over the news. It was. That they're real. I saw parts of it. It didn't lead the news. It was kind of like in the last 30 seconds when they put kind of uplifting shots of people conquering diseases and stuff. No, this is a big government press conference. We've heard some crazy stuff. I heard some crazy stuff.
in the last week from a dude I know talking about aliens and their existence. I don't want to get too deep into their name, people, but it's like pretty crazy. Oh, apparently they're here among us and all this sort of stuff. Yeah, that's right. Yes, a simile. I didn't know which square you were pointing at. That was at me, right? Don't say it out loud.
Hey, guys, preach. Yeah, preach. I'm trying to protect the innocent, dude. You know why? Because snitches get stitches, okay? We're filling a sweatshirt. And they also get preferable sentencing, usually, because they've made some sort of an agreement with the prosecution and the government. Which brings us to our guest, Mark Meadows. Let's get to our seshi. Let's do a seshi. Which brings us to our guest for today's seshi, because our guest,
He is guilty of entertaining all of us a lot over the years. I can't wait to meet this little outlaw. He's an entertainment outlaw. And he really is. When you see who it is, you're going to say, yes, he is an entertainment outlaw because...
He is kind of sometimes outside of the system a little bit. He does his own thing. He kind of doesn't live here. He kind of lives with his family out in the middle of nowhere, sort of. Not in the middle of nowhere. Still living at home, huh? But he's still living at home with the family. But he doesn't just do the films and all this. He's also, the last couple years, this guy has been busy writing books. And not just books. Like New York Times best-selling books. Yeah.
Jake Tapper again? We can't have him on again. So many great films that we're not going to talk about. We're not talking about the films, but we can talk about the work and how it gets to this work. But we are going to talk about his books, and we are going to talk about his foundation, and then we are going to talk about his new book, Just Because, which I read, which is for kids, that comes out September 12, 2023.
It's Texas's own Matthew McConaughey. Let's go. No way. He's back. We finally got him back.
I have been here before, but I didn't stay on the show. Matthew, please jump right into your experience the last time. Hang on. Hang on. I'm prepared. I'm prepared for this, Matthew. Oh, yeah. Okay. So Matthew was on. Hang on one second. Oh, no. Please don't have playback. Before we do, Matthew, you came on the show a couple years ago. Oh, yeah. And he was ready to go. And Jason was having some tech problems.
difficulty, shall we say. Oh, shall we say. And did you wait? I must say, did you notice this time pregame how cock sure he was about his technical ability? Telling the back people, shut up, back off. I got you. Listen to where you were a year ago. And that's why I said I love that he's having tech problems today. Let's take a listen to where he was last time. Guys, let's roll it. Let's listen. Oh, my God.
It sounds like he maybe cloned his computer onto another computer and it didn't install the drivers. It's a good time to check that out right before we have a guest. Sean, take your headphones off one more moment, please. Oh, thank God. Thank you for asking. I know I've been waiting for so long. Matthew. Matthew, thanks, man. God damn it. You okay to go till just before, what is it, eight-year time?
I've got something in one hour and nine, ten minutes. Okay. So let's go right up to that number. You got it. You got it. Copy that. Perfect. Thanks, man. Thank you so much. Yep. Sean, you're good. Hello? Hello? Hello? Can you hear us? Can you hear us?
It's not, I don't see, I don't see it here in the sound thing. So let's cancel. Let's just reschedule this thing. I'm in a total fucking tailspin. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Sorry, buddy. Great. Who the fuck is that? Who is that? Great, that's helpful. Is that our guy?
Is that our guest?
Let me tell you what I've heard here over the last 30 minutes. We got a reboot here. Oh, my God. My daughter's iPad got cloned, and then it got wiped right before the dog peed on it, so I got to reboot one more time. Wait a minute, it's buffering. Wait, let me reinstall. No, I'm installing. It's going to restart. We got a failure. I need a security check. Oh, shit, we got a virus. Let me reschedule this whole show one more time. Shit, you know what? You guys start without me. Fuck that. Everyone be patient. Oh, shit, what are we going to do? I'm going to tell the fucking pale- Dude, oh. We're good. We're good. Shit, Matthew, man.
That's fantastic. All of that, while you still had a sandwich in your head and you would not have been really entertaining, but not as entertaining as watching fucking Bateman. You're literally just fucking mentally meditating on this shit. God, I'm in a tailspin. Listen. I'm in a tailspin.
I don't know what's going on. Rob, pause it, pause it, pause it, because we can play the whole thing. Okay, so now we're back in. Batemoon was just glitching. Okay.
He was glitching. And what we didn't know is, Sean, none of us knew, when Bateman finally rage quit, as we say in the video gaming world, he finally rage quit and he was gone. And then Matthew rips his camera off and he starts laughing. And Sean's going, Matthew, I didn't know it was you. And he's written it all down.
Yes, he wrote it all down in a pound. Like a court reporter. Yeah, it was great. He was reading that. It was perfect comedy. Okay, so all that stuff was you were doing me with stuff I just said? That was you. That was you. Oh, my God. That's just mortifying. And you were going on and on. You went so long. I was like, this is...
This is getting funnier. Yeah. And funnier and funnier. The worst part is me hearing somebody laughing, thinking it's Will or Shawn and going, who did that? That's not helpful. And then I just slammed my laptop shut, took my ball and went home like a bitch. You remember this. Oh,
Oh, yeah. So it doesn't happen often. It's not one of my prouder moments. Oh, my gosh. I mean, you just come back from golf, so I'm guessing you didn't play to your handicap. I did not play well. No, it's a safe bet. In fact, it had never happened before, and it has not happened since. We've had a couple times where a guest has had a technical glitch and we haven't been able to do it. But we've never had it in that situation before, and that was, it went from being, we felt so bad because you're waiting for so long.
And so we felt bad. Then there's a point, we can listen to this now too, there was a point where Sean and I start doing Sing For Real. Do you remember that? We start doing Sing, just to entertain ourselves and hopefully you while Jason's in a full meltdown.
So angry. And I think, did I, I think, I think maybe you had told me it was a big guess, so don't fuck around kind of thing. I just knew I was blowing it. Blowing it. Wasn't I on my daughter's computer or something? Yes. Wasn't that the problem? Something like that, yeah. And I'm dumb? Yeah. Well, you were just winging it. You were on your daughter's computer. I'm dumb and hot-headed. It's a great combo. You were tardy, dumb, and hot-headed. Yeah, tardy too. Oh.
Well, listen, Matthew, I mean, the fact that you've come back after that absolute wipeout, I can't thank you enough. I know. I mean, you're the greatest. Yes, thank you for being here. It's so great. You are an absolute kingpin for coming back, which is just the best. And I have been waiting, and I've been talking to Bennett and Rob and Michael Terry and all the guys preparing for this moment. We were so excited to get the...
The audio queued up. We all went through to find the peak moment, which was Matthew reading out all this stuff. And then I found out afterwards that it was you. And I was, God damn it. He was mortified. And the fact that it was you laughing and that I actually inadvertently yelled at you and slammed the laptop on you. I was just like... It was great. High quality entertainment. It was. But it was a pretty tough seshy. I will say it was a pretty tough seshy.
It was a messy sheshy. So, Matthew, I mentioned in the intro, and this is one of the things, like I said, you are an Academy Award winning actor. I know, I was going to say insert applause, but fuck it, we'll just do it. Which is so rad and so well deserved, and you've done so much great stuff over the years. But what's really amazing is, in the last couple of years, as I mentioned, you have been writing books. So you wrote Greenlights. Yes.
huge success. And now you've written this kid's book, which as I mentioned, the thing that I read, and I thought, I really think, and I read a lot of kids' books because I have basically, you know, I have three kids and a stepson. And a fourth grade intelligence. I read them just because I don't have kids. It took me two weeks to read it.
But I read it today, and like I say, I read a lot of kids' books. I think it's fantastic, man. Thank you. I really, really enjoyed it, and I mean that. And you guys don't know this, but so Matthew wrote, well, you can tell them in your own words what sort of the genesis was of this book. Yeah.
Well, so y'all got kids, right? You start thinking about how to parent them all the time, man. They come on with different questions. You're going, oh, geez. You know that moment when they ask you those questions and you know, like, oh, this is a doozy and I better have a badass answer because what I say right now is going to shape the way they see the world from now on. And sometimes you're up for it. Sometimes you got to go get another cup of coffee, you know? Anyway, I...
I'm always thinking about that stuff. So I had this dream one night, and I wake up at 2.30, and it was a Bob Dylan ditty, man. It was, just because I threw the dart does not mean that it stuck. And just because you guys killed don't mean there is no luck. And so I just started, the hook was just because, and I get up at 2.30, and I jam down all these couplets until 6.30 in the morning. I got about 100 couplets. Wow. I then go back to bed because...
It's nice to sleep on some of those midnight, those 2.30 in the morning inspirations to see if they still hold, right? So I get up at 10 o'clock next morning, look at it. I was like, oh, this is pretty groovy. This could be fun. It's a nice, fun, ditty song. And as I looked through it, I was like, you know what? There's pieces in here. There's about 25 couples that would be good for kiddos that are like about things that I've been trying to talk to my kids about, questions they've been coming to me with. And so I put those together, sent them to my book.
Book agent, he goes, this would be a great kid's book. You should share it. And that's just because. That's so cool. That's so cool. How old are your kids? 10, 13, 14.
15, 10, 13, 14. Right. So they're coming into a different set of questions now that they might not even admit they need answers to. And yeah, it's a whole different set. But what's great about it is it really highlights the contradictions of
in life, right? And I love that. And for a kid, this is what I love so much. He just said it, but it starts off with, just because they threw the dart doesn't mean that it stuck. Just because they got skills doesn't mean there is no luck.
Just because they let you down doesn't mean you gotta get low. Just because they're clumsy doesn't mean they have no flow. And it's just all this stuff. And the illustration, too, your illustrator, whom-- Rene Correa. Really great illustrations. Like, really helps you tell this story in this really cool way.
And I think as a kid, there's so many great lessons. There's one where like the kid, it talks about, I'm going to find this one because this is one of my favorites that I love. And there was such a sort of great message there.
"Just because I lie doesn't mean that I'm a liar." And you see this older brother. The little girl's hit the baseball through a window. And the next thing, the older brother's taking the blame for it, protecting the little sister. And he says, "Just because I lie doesn't mean that I'm a liar." And it was kind of a cool lesson. - Yeah. - Sometimes a good time to take a white lie. You know what I mean? And the other thing that came from is,
And, you know, somebody does something. You tell me, Will, if you tell me a lie right now, and I go, man, you're an effing liar. And you go, oh, man, no, I was trying to get away with this. Sorry, McConaughey, blah, blah, blah. And you don't continue to lie to me.
I was wrong in casting the whole blanket over your character. But it's very different to call someone a liar than to go, man, you lied to me. Right. Because you call someone, especially kiddos, man, you call someone, or adults too, you call them a liar or whatever. You blanket them with anything in a proper, not a liar. Right. They get defensive, bro. That's heavy, yeah. Those are fighting words. You're going, hey, man, you're casting it on my character. You say, hey, man, I don't like that specific time you did to me. You did me wrong.
Don't lie to me again. Yeah. All right? That's a different thing. We can come together on that and repair. You can go, I'm sorry. I can go, I accept your apology. We move on. Yeah. Now...
If someone continues to bullshit and lie to you over and over, then you go, well, once shame on you, twice shame on me. I guess you are a liar. That's a character trait. But usually we blanket somebody with a term, a noun. You're a liar. That person's a liar. They got to wear that scarlet letter. Where do you sit with all this stuff? Are you someone like myself, like if somebody...
does something like that to me, I will call them on it. But as soon as they apologize, I will forgive. I probably won't forget, but not at a grudge level. But like, I'll trust someone until they give me a reason not to. Yep. But there are other people. Yeah, go ahead. Oh, I got a couplet in there about just because I forgive you does not mean that I still trust.
Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's true. That's got to be rebuilt. I go in trust first too. Yeah. I go in with a very high trust level early. Some people go, you're going in with too high of a trust level. But look, if someone comes and is able to say, hey, man, sorry, I bogeyed. You know, my bad. And I sincerely believe it. I love going. Forgiveness is not only great for that person. Yeah.
It's amnesty for us who's doing the forgiving. Right. You know, I got a couple in here that says just because, what is it? Just because I let go does not mean that I quit climbing. Right. Someone asked, kid asked me about that. And I was like, well, that's kind of like forgiveness.
letting go is forgiven, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And does that mean you're not evolving? Does that mean you're not ascending? No, most of the times that means you are ascending. You are maturing. The great illustration with that, if I remember correctly, is it's a girl on a skateboard and she goes down and then in the next picture, she's kind of rising up on the roof. It's cool. Are there people in your life that you, I mean, the guys will know why I'm asking this. Are there people in your life that you still have a hard time forgiving? Yeah.
You know, because, yeah, I know. Guess who the first person is? I don't know. Oh, yourself. That's a lot of what this book's about, man. All these things we talk about doing to others. Man, we got to include going, hey, how about yourself? We got to have the proper amount of leniency. Well, yeah, I mean, a writer writes what a writer knows, right? I mean, so all this stuff came from you. You had these thoughts, you had these feelings, and you brought it out in words. Yeah, that's so cool.
And now, a word from our sponsor. And now, back to the show. Yeah, I was thinking about what you were saying about casting someone with they lie to you and then cast him as a liar. And kind of for me, it falls in the same category as...
When people say, "You know, I'm the kind of person who--" I always say, "Hang on a second. We're all the kind of person who anything on any given day." You don't get to just own that lane. On this day, you did that. But on the next day, you might do this. And so I kind of reject that a little bit. And I think that we are all capable of making mistakes and we're all capable of redemption.
and we're all capable of a lot of things, don't you? Yeah, I do. And look, those pretext contexts, you know, it's a little bit like that. Okay, well, now I'm being honest. You're like, oh, shit, were you lying the rest of the time? Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You pretext these things with...
It was just like, I don't need the supposition. Don't set me up. I get it. I'm on par with you, man. Come in straight. You know, let's be straight, frank, speaking yes and no's. We all know the maybes are in the middle, and it's a contradiction. And yeah, you may bogey today, you may birdie tomorrow. You may do it well today and then F it up tomorrow. So we come in on that flat line. It's a little bit easier to get along without the pretext of, now let me set this up, what I'm trying to say. Well, you know, I've always, you know,
I remember we were walking back from dinner that night about five years ago in South of France, a Woody's thing, and you said to me, you go, Arnett, we don't know each other. He goes, Arnett, we got a lot of friends in common who say that you and I should be friends. I was like, let's go. I was like, let's go. And I love that about you, and you're so—I love your confidence, and I love—every time I hear you speak, you've got—I don't know, there's like this kind of like—
I want to say wisdom, but I don't want it to sound too hokey. You've got this thing about you where you talk about how you feel in a way that I find is very disarming, and I love it. It's a superpower, I think, to talk about the way you... and be vulnerable. Yes, on Instagram, I watch your stuff, and I'm like, where... I mean, you're like, you know, an Oprah type of, like...
you know, you have this gift. But it's a vulnerability, I think. Right? I think that that, don't you think so, Sean? I mean, I don't know. Yeah, yeah, for sure. For sure. Vulnerability. But we talk about that a lot too. But just like,
What you said, Will, and to Matthew about your wisdom is like, where do you get, how, what happened in your life that gave you this kind of self-awareness enough to look inside yourself and share then, be able to communicate and have the tools to communicate to other people your philosophies and life values and all those things, which I just absorb. I don't know. It's a good question, man. I mean... Thank you.
Let me give you one of many answers here. And I wrote this the other day. And this may be a bit of, when you're talking, it's a way to talk about vulnerability in a fun way. And I wrote this, I said, look, we are all brilliant, dramatic actors when we realize we're in a comedy.
- Yeah, yeah. The comedy, like, it allows us, we were talking about it allows you to forgive, it allows you to be an ass, it allows you to go over the top and says, "Oh, I went way too far that time, come on back, got a second chance." It allows you to go, "This is not so precious.
It allows you to not go, well, you know, I want to tell you, sometimes I do this, as you were saying, Will. It's like, man, we're in it. We're in it. We get it. Come on, man. Okay, Bogey, you screwed up. Now try it again. The comedy of life allows me, I think, for certain truths to hear them or pick something out that someone says. I love listening to people. I've traveled. I love that, too. And I pick out things that people say.
To the extent you feel comfortable talking about it, like what was childhood like? What was like upbringing? Like do you think all of these, this time in your life where you are sharing all of these great thoughts and ideas now have come to fruition because of stuff that happened to you as a childhood or you were raised in a certain way? Man, I don't know. I mean, look, I've always been an existential dude. I've always been intrigued with,
Ooh, if I can just get a little closer to figuring out the riddle. The big riddle. What are we doing here? Is there a God? What's happening? What really matters? What doesn't? That entertains me. You do find a way in which to steer a lot of your performances, a lot of your characters into places of really solid grounding moments.
kind of foundations. There's a deep humanity to all the characters you play and some, you can tell, is not on the page. But you find that place in you and you share that through the character and then to the audience. And it's always...
It always goes down easy. I don't think you ever ask the audience to buy something that you're selling that is inauthentic. I appreciate that. Cool. Thank you for that. Thank you. Yeah, for sure. You know how that is. You don't want to be watching a performance having to do the math.
Yeah. We all love to be manipulated. We just don't like to be confused. Yeah. But you find, you find a place to keep it inside your, your scope, your boundaries, your person. And, and I, to build on, on, on Sean's question, like, do you, do you think that's always been there? Was it something, I'm sure as we get older and wiser, it gets better and better, our ability to be human. But like, were you one of your parents kind of like that? Yeah, that's what I was going to say. Did somebody model that for you?
Look, I come from a family of hams, that's for damn sure. I mean, I'm probably third out of five, my two brothers, mom and dad, third. And I would be a bronze medal winner as far as when it comes to wanting and willingness and performing. Yeah, really? Yeah. I mean, dad was maybe fourth now that I'm talking about it. Dad was an absolute host of a ham. My mom was always...
talk about existential logic, you know. I got a story in the book of Greenlights where she told me to sign my name under this Ann Ashford poem. And I said, but I didn't write it. She goes, but you understand it and it means something to you. I said, yeah. She goes, well, then it's yours. Ha.
I signed my name under it, and I won the seventh grade poetry contest. Early AI. Early AI plagiarism. But I mean, so she was always like, no TV. Why, Mom? Because I'm not going to let you sit in here and watch somebody do something that you can go out and find out if you can do it yourself. It was like, bam, okay. So you were just pushed on to say it's to be the subject. That, I will say, inadvertently or indirectly, was...
set me up for doing what I do is you are always forced to be the subject. Get in, go find out. Go find out. It's live. You get one take. Go. Don't ask. Don't watch. Do it. Come back with a scar. Let me know. Yeah. I love that. And then the comedy side of that is what tickles my family...
Bruises a lot of people. We were like, we went comedy quick. So there was no risk of embarrassment or shame or making a clown of yourself. You got to pull your pants down to get their attention, right? You got to. And if you came in on any kind of high horse or a little arrogant or a little thought you were the shit, my family just penetrated you to the ground until you cried uncle. And as soon as you cried uncle, they'd all lift you up and throw you in the air and be like, yeah!
You'd be like, what's your favorite drink? What's your favorite meal? Let's cook it for you. Yeah, same. That was like a test. You know, I remember I have three older brothers. They would treat me. I remember one time they pinned me down and forced me to shave because I was just like at 12 or 13 years old. I was just getting a little peach fuzz on my upper lip. And they're like, we're going to teach you how to shave. Like, what? What?
And they pinned me down in the family room and got a razor and they just covered me and they shaved my face. Yes. So bizarre. That's cute. Rites of passage, initiations, you know. Yeah, crazy. But now let me ask you because...
You know, I don't know if you ever felt this way to be the second you were on your rise to becoming Matthew McConaughey, as we know him, and this big, massive global superstar. Was there ever a moment, because you're so outgoing and you're so willing to share your
every thought and feeling now, which is great. Was there ever a moment where you didn't? And when you didn't, what was the switch that made you go, you know what, fuck it. I'm not going to be mysterious anymore. I'm not going to do this anymore. I'm going to just share everything who I am. Sure. Look, I mean, I'm still measured about what I share. I just have my mind's quicker to notice as it's coming out of my mouth. Do I do, who, I could say something right now that I know would be in bold print. And as it's coming out of my mouth, I can catch myself going, beep, beep.
Let me dovetail that a hair. Now, that took years of getting there. Did I notice, do I also notice that there is real value in demand for celebrities, movie stars to not be around until that Friday night when your movie comes out? Yes. Is there value to having two people
tinted black Suburbans when you leave in the paparazzi follow because they don't know which one you're in and you sneak in the back and you're not seen. Yes. Is there value to wearing the same thing out every single day so every paparazzi shot looks like it was the same day so they lose value? Yes. Is it value to go, "Where is he? I don't know where they are. I can only go spend time with them when they come out in a movie in the theater." Yes.
I just tried that for a little bit, very short amount of time. I was like, bullshit, this is too much work. Yeah, I was just going to say, it sounds exhausting. I started to notice, especially when I had kids, I was like, man, I started to notice if you're going to live by that code that I just brought up, you start to let your fame wag your life. Meaning, I always said, that's what Just Keep Living's about. What are we doing? I got rights as a...
a citizen, a mammal before I have rights or rights taken away from me as any kind of celebrity. So for instance, my, we're in New York.
My son's four years old, fire truck. The girl was doing my makeup, husband, he's a fire chief at the fire department. She goes, hey, my son says, I'd love to see a fire truck. She goes, oh, let me call my husband, he'll swing by. He swings by the Greenwich Hotel, right there, I mean, central. This is when the paparazzi are all around. Pulls up front, my son's like, I wanna go see the fire truck. Well, I know if I go down there, it's gonna be a paparazzi big shootout. But I'm also like,
My son wants to see his first fire truck. That's gotta take precedent, right? If I tell him, no, not right now. I feel like a heel. I feel like a coward. I feel like a wuss. What am I doing? I gotta go down and get in the middle of it. He got to see the fire truck. Later on, I had to explain why was everyone watching and why was it a big deal? But you got to see the fire truck. I've chose to say, let me go on with my life. Let me make choices I'd make with my life first.
before I'm going to curtail those to like, oh, I want to be obscure. Sean had a similar moment. I was with him a couple years ago. There we go. And we were on, Sean was, he gave me a ride on the G5. And he was, and he said, we're going to have. The G nickel. And they came out with the G nickel and they came out with the lobster. And he said, I got lobster. And I said, you're damn right you did. Good for you.
So he started eating the lobster and then he looked over and he realized that I was videotaping him. I did. I ate lobster. Bless you, Sean. Isn't that one of the great, that's one of the caveats of fame and access or any kind of success is you say yes to things because a lot of times you're like,
I never had the option to say yes or no. You damn right the answer's yes. And you gotta ask yourself when they go, do you want lobster on the G5 trip? And you're going like, I never had fucking lobster before. You gotta ask yourself first, do I like lobster? Yeah, exactly. Well, on that, Matthew, with...
You know, you seem so genuinely authentic, honest. We used the word vulnerable earlier. And it's something that I try to strive for too. I know Sean and Will do as well. And sometimes I feel like what we do for a living is at odds with that quest in that like the definition of what we do is, you know, we're professional liars. We're pretending to be somebody other than us.
What's your level of comfort with that? Can you reconcile those two things? How have you been able to do that? Dude, I'm going to go with Bob Dylan on that one. This whole thing about, oh, I got to get to the truth of who I am. Dylan goes the opposite. He's like, man, we are who we create, whatever we create. We're all creations, you know? So I would also go to the extent that as much as, as you said, Bateman,
we're inhabiting someone else. Yeah. Tell me how you feel about this, but ultimately, we're being that part of ourselves. Right, yeah, my version of that person, yeah. And so, you know, in that way, acting and performing is an absolute vacation. And an expansion of who we are, really, because you're exploring sort of the edges of it. It's like the old Marantz equalizer. You turn up...
500 hkz part of ourself you turn down if it's a saturday night character you turn down responsibility and you turn down these other things if it's a monday morning character and you're an astronaut you turn up responsibility and you turn up conscientiousness and you lower the the haphazard sides and you just and then you go go yeah and then it's just trust in living in there and going trust me i've had plenty of roles that i got in that i'm like
When this movie's over, am I going to come out of this? Because if I continue this, I'm going to jail, you know what I mean? Or whatever it is, you know? Or I'm going to be a buddy dud, you know? And, you know. With all these incredible insights that you have, like who, I'm just watching you talk and listening to everywhere and hanging on every word. Who do you, who gets your juices going just having, shooting the shit, having a great conversation with?
I bet those conversations with the kids as they get older, at least I'm finding, I got a 16-year-old and an 11-year-old daughters, the conversations get even better. Like I'm having some of my closest conversations with who I am with my girls now. That's great. I'm starting to have that too. You know, it's that transition. We go from just being a father to being a father and a friend. And then as soon as you slip into that, a bit of the friend, you can kind of be like,
Yeah. Let me know, you know, and they can slide with, and they're not worried about the consequence or if I give the wrong answer, I'm in trouble. You're kind of like, yeah, let me know. Oh, let me tell you how that was with me. You know, we've had the first kiss discussions. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And, you know, nervous and how you do it. And I'm like,
Let me tell you about my first one, man, Nature Trail. Name was Amy. Went out, I was really excited. And that old, I forget what movie it was where the lip gets caught in the braces. No, Matthew. I did, and they bled all over. And we bumped noses. I didn't know whether to go left or right, and I double juked, and I flinched, and it was not good, man. And so then I get my son laughing.
And he's like, all right. I'm like, yeah, trust me. They don't have to try and be perfect, you know, on this thing. Just take your time, blah, blah, blah. I just had the same conversation I've had with my sons. And I picked my son up. He was on this trip. And so his mom and I, she was like, I was like, yeah, I'll go pick him up. I went and picked him up at the airport. We had like a four-hour drive home. And it was great because I don't know if you guys noticed. What I love driving with my kids is driving.
that you're both looking forward and they tend to share more when we drive. Yeah. On a long drive. Oh, really? Why is that? Because they don't feel you looking at them. 100%. Because you're looking at the road. That's why I prefer phone calls instead of FaceTime. I feel like phone calls are a little bit more honest than FaceTime. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I get that. I get that. Hey.
You could argue that's why some people have actually... I've formed some relationships over COVID doing Zoom meets that I like more from the distance than I did in person. Yeah, exactly. That makes sense. But I do find that those connections, JB, like you were saying, those connections with the kids in that... I don't know, it reminds me. I think I told you guys, I had one of the greatest conversations with my son, one of my sons. I won't say who because I don't want to embarrass him, but...
He said to me a couple years ago, we were sitting there, I could tell he was kind of down. It was a Sunday afternoon. We went around, we're sitting there and he was on the ground and he has his head in his hand and I go, what's going on, buddy? He goes, I just don't know where I, he looks up and he goes, I just don't know where I fit in.
And the fact that he was able to be honest with me in that moment, and we ended up having this incredible conversation. And it was one of the great, I don't know where it ranked for him in his short life, but in my longer life, it's one of the greatest conversations I've ever had. That's right. I love that. You know, I've got a good friend in Austin. His name is Bart Nags. He's raised a few girls successfully out of his house. And he and I were talking just a few months ago as my kids are hitting teens. And he's like,
dude, there's just one thing you want to do whatever you can to maintain through these teen years. I go, what? He goes, access. To let them be honest like that and to be able to go, I don't know where I fit in. Yeah. You know? And it's true to pick it out on those spots where it's not, we're going to sit down and talk. Look me in the eye. No, where it's a little more informal to like, we're driving, we're doing something or taking a walk. You do find out more, but to maintain some access to keep,
Some honesty, you know, in these years I'm hoping to do. Yeah. And I feel like that's the friendship part of the relationship. But then I feel I worry sometimes, well, am I sacrificing what could be more useful to them, which is parenting.
at the expense of, you know, sacrificing the friendship is like, so I battle with that sometimes or trying to keep the access door open by being super friends. Yeah. But sometimes that's not helpful to them, you know, cause they've got friends, but they've only got one dad, one mom.
That's a tough line to walk, man. I think the kids have such a great bullshit meter. They're born with it. And we wear it out as we get older. Whatever, people, other people, society, whatever wears it out. And I think that what kids, I find, in my experience, I'm not preaching anything, but my experience is
If you are honest with your kids in that way and you're authentic, we were talking about, Matthew, about you being authentic. If you can be authentic in those moments, they get it and they can feel you being authentic. If you're not trying to get something from them, but you're just trying to relate to them. Yeah. Right? A relationship is just two people relating. And if you can relate to them, they'll...
They'll be honest with you. They'll share. They'll give you that access as long as you stay in that zone. Just keep it authentic. That's it. I think that's the key. I think. It sure helps. I mean, look, it's, you know, I don't know about y'all. I was...
I was raised-- Camille and I have much longer conversations with our kids than my parents had with me. I mean, my parents, you could talk about it, and I was the question. I was the why. But how? But why? But why? Mom would entertain that a little bit, but very quickly, within a few minutes, it became, "Because I said so." - Right. - And I'm your parent. And that was it. Conversation over. - Yeah.
It's that thing. Because some conversations, you start at 8 p.m. and you're going to try to explain. You look up and it's 11. And then it's midnight. And you're going, you're wearing me out here, man. It's like, because I said so, man. Because I'm 53 and I'm your dad and you're 10. Go to bed. You know what I mean? Who's the disciplinarian between you and Camilla? Who's the parent? Who's the friend? Or do you guys switch off real good? Well...
We try to watch the old good cop, bad cop stuff. I mean, look, I got one daughter, and I'm guilty of probably being a little more on the lenient side with my daughter. You know, it's the only relationship that the honeymoon never ends, you know? Right. So, but I mean, Camille's more day-to-day, moment-to-moment. I'm a little more like...
Guys, gang, you've been stretching that one a little bit. The little things are adding up. I'm going to step in here, and I'll go in and be general. And all of a sudden, I'm the general, and they're like, oh, shit. And it's like, no, this is how it's going down right now. And I've had to talk with them. This one's a great one. And this has helped with my boys is going, you know, if I let you get away with that with your mother,
What is that teaching you to allow your son to do to the woman you're going to fall in love with? Right. You know? And then to go cut even deeper and more direct is, boys, that's my wife. Right. What kind of husband am I teaching you to be if I let you get away with that?
Do they hear that? That one actually cut into places where they understood it in ways that I thought was going to be too above their head. But I called it personal. I said, this is the woman that I fell in love with, that I've married, and we got together and made y'all, man. And if I'm letting you get away with that, let you disrespect her? What kind of husband am I teaching you to be? And they were like, whoa. It became sort of a bit of a...
You know, with the boys, it became a little bit of a, oh, that's my responsibility as your son. But it's kind of fun that like now they're old enough now to really intellectualize that kind of thing and finish that sentence, you know, that you started for them. You know, that's, yeah. We'll be right back. All right, back to the show.
So wait, Matthew, I asked you this like five minutes ago, but you were thinking about it. I don't want to put you in a spot, so you don't have to answer if you don't want. But you have so much to share and to teach through your just incredible brain. Who is your guru? Do you have somebody in your life that you're like, God, you know what? I got to listen to this guy. Or you have the greatest conversations where you actually walk away learning something. Because like I said, I learn from you all the time just watching your Instagram. Yeah.
I don't have a certain person. I have in the last five years started to seek out elder mentors in a way that I didn't before. Yeah, that's what I mean. And look, ironically, I was writing about it last night. Man, I'm losing my mentors. They're dying. Over this last four years, I don't know how it's been for y'all, but I've had some elder friends that were...
that were right there. They slowed down, but they were right there holding it. But boy, that last, all of a sudden the drop is steep and they're gone. Has that triggered for you something? And I'm not prying for an answer on the specifics, but at least for me,
You know, for all four of us, we're closer to death than we are to birth. And at some point, especially if you're semi-intelligent, like I think the four of us are, you do start to think about, well, what are some of the things I want to when that moment of clarity comes where you're like, okay, here I am in the last week, you know, I'm in hospice or whatever the hell it is, you know, when everyone gets the end of their life.
what are some of the things I'm gonna wish I could say, yes, I did that, yes, I did that. Are you starting to think about some of those things or am I being the kind of adult I wanted to be? I started doing that about,
About six years ago. It was part of the reason I think I wrote the book Greenlights. I started to get the courage enough to project to my deathbed, to my eulogy and go, what's it going to be, man? Where's your head and heart and spirit going to be? What's your legacy going to be? How are you going to look back? What are people going to say? How are you going to be introduced after you're gone? Right. That's good. We think that's morose. No.
But if it's inevitable, how can it be morose? Right. Because it's going to happen to everybody, right? So to look at it, and if anything, it's given me more of a charge to go, okay, well, let's make this shit count. Yeah, but most people with your success would be, yeah, I did it. They think they're going to live forever. They just kick the can down the road. I won't say who this is, but somebody super duper successful –
I was talking to the other day and I was asking him about his health regimen. And he was like, yeah, you know what? Here's the deal. I don't know what your religious belief is, but I believe that we all kind of come around. You know, we do multiple laps. You know, we're always working on things, you know, reincarnation, whatever the hell it is. But he says, I like this lap.
and I started laughing because this guy's like enormously successful he says I just don't want this to end like I'm having a really good time and I want to eat yeah by the way spending time with all those like when any time you get around any kind of those like sort of billionaire types or whatever the one thing I noticed that they all talk about is their mortality and their fucking health it's it it's
all they tell you, because it's the one thing they can't buy. Right. But they can improve it. They're like, motherfucker, I've got these mountains of cash, but I can't buy immortality? Right. I'm fucking like, no, dude, you're going to die just like everybody fucking else. The other thing is, I also noticed, you know, these guys know my good buddy died a few months ago, a childhood pal, and it's kind of really, it's made me ask a lot of questions in the last few months. And the one thing I realized is like,
We all know the deal. The deal is we're all gonna die. We just kick the can down the road till we're about this age. And we trick ourselves, and what happens is they go, hey, so-and-so died. What? Yeah, yeah. What do you think was gonna happen? Unbelievable. Unbelievable.
He died, he didn't live to a thousand? Yeah, you know what Joan Rivers said, like, just a few months before she died, she's like, I'm 86, when I die, nobody's gonna go, so soon? Right. Yeah. Um,
I want to hit 100 so bad. Oh, God. Do you? Yeah. Do you really? Just on a numbers game? Just pure ego? That's the number. I really want to get to 100. I do feel like this generation will do that more commonly than the last. Yeah. I feel like we got a good shot. Well, with your diet of nuts and cardboard, your innards look like they're 100. Don't worry. I could use you to pack my clothes here in New York. But with your success, don't you feel... I'm just going back to what you said about like, you know, what's...
What's my legacy? What am I going to leave behind? But my God, the body of work is mind-blowing. It's really fucking awesome. It's more than any actor. It's the top of the heap. So what else is there to accomplish in your mind that would make you feel like, now I have enough to leave behind. Now I have a legacy. Now I have something for people to introduce me as, as you say. Well, I mean, my negotiables are different forms of art, right?
But my non-negotiables are those three kids I was talking about. Yeah, yeah. I hope that when they are out of the house and as they become adults and after I'm gone, that they'll be able to list me. That the three of them will be able to list me as best friend on one hand. One of their five top best friends. Oh, that's great. That's a dream of mine.
That's awesome. And that gets into that friendship thing we were talking about. But I can't go full bore on that yet. I still do have to be a parent. I still do have to give myself credit and go, I'm a father for a reason. I'm 53. We have, if we don't know better, what's evolution for? At the same time, trying to be that friend and hope I'm on their hand. Yeah. It also, for me at least, it kind of demands that I live my life in a way that
that they can maintain respect for me, which translates to friendship usually. I mean, you know, or put another way, I'm not really close friends with anybody that I don't deeply respect. Right. So it's a good safeguard against, you know, letting your life run off the rails if you're really trying to hold the respect and friendship of people you care about. And then I'm trying to double down.
on whatever respect I've earned and gained. I'm trying to double down on that. I mean, you know, there's, look, let's be honest. There's the baseline of who pays the rent, who puts the food on the table, who's giving you a chance to get an education.
Who's up in the middle of the night taking care of you when you're sick? Yeah, because I'm tired of it. Right. I'm sick and tired of it. And they have to know that that's not just like... I'm over it. This isn't just a one-way street. And then we talked to them a lot about how did we get what success is.
that we've had. We talk about when in the right way. We talk about, has there been luck along the way? You're damn right. Has there been trying to do it well? Trying to be as competent at a craft as I could be? Their mother as well? Yes, there has.
But what's that saying about luck? Luck is the result of preparation and discipline or something like that. Yeah. I don't know. I talked to my son yesterday about this idea. I was saying, he was talking about cool kids in school and stuff, and I said, man, just do what makes you feel happy. I said, if you can be, and he started painting a lot in the last year and a half, and I said,
If you can live a life where you get to be creative and you can do that on a daily basis, that's what you do. - Yeah. - You'll be so lucky. You'll be so happy in your life, no matter what the sort of the outcome is. And I go-- And if you want to know what success is, and I always say this to them, if you want to know what success is, and I pull up my phone and I show them the video of Sean eating lobster on a G5, I go, "This is success." - I knew it was coming. - Yeah, man.
Can I peel it for you? Yeah. Wait a second, wait a second. We've taxed you so much, but I want to ask you one thing. I want to get into the Greenlight Initiative or the foundation that you and your wife started and what you guys are doing. It's so fucking cool. Tell the guys a little bit about what it is. Check this out, man. This is pretty cool, and it's low-hanging fruit. Yeah.
But you know what I say about low-hanging fruit? Still fruit. Pick it. It's still fruit. You know? So first bill, Bipartisan and Safe Communities Act, was passed just over a year ago, right, to safe in schools. First one passed in 30 years. So billions of dollars of federal money are there to safe in schools, mental health counselors, and even physically safe in schools like metal detectors, panic buttons, et cetera.
Our congressman in Texas, who down there in Uvalde, where the shooting was, where Camilla and I went down, comes to me four months after and says, Matthew, I got 119 school districts. Eight, I think it's eight, have applied for a grant and zero have been awarded. I'm like, what? We find out another out of 13,800 school districts in America for this very...
popular grant from the Department of Justice to safety schools, 405 applications. Total. 235 awarded grants. The math doesn't add up. You're like, what's going on? When we started studying this and found out...
I was amazed at how many school districts don't even know that the grants are there to apply for. Number two, the ones that do know are superintendents who are in the ones that need it in like high poverty rate schools. The superintendent is the bus driver and the PE teacher. He doesn't have a, he or she doesn't have the damn time or the expertise to write out one of these 50 page grants. And I understand it. I can't even fill out a customs form without scratching shit out. And they're complicated. They're really complicated. So they're like, I'm not even gonna write the grant.
There's also people that are like, that's federal money and that money's blue right now and I'm red so I don't want that money. I'm like, guys, that money ain't blue or red. It's fucking green. You spend it. It's there and the government wants you to spend it, wants you to get awarded it. So the billions of dollars are there. Then we find out that it's use it or lose it.
In year 2026, if these billions of dollars are not allocated, it'll be reallocated somewhere else. And we'll look back at this Bipartisan Saved Communities Act, which has already done some good, but we'll look back and go, so much of that bill was symbolic. And bravo to us. First one passed in 28 years, and what do we do with it? So we started this Green Lights Grant Initiative to help follow through as private citizens working with the public government to say, hey, let's cut through that red tape.
165 of the highest poverty rate schools in America are our main target. We will have a full grant writing service for those schools to file a grant that will most likely get awarded by the government to save from their schools. That's great. So you write the grant for them. We have a grant writer who can write it for them. The second tier is we have a website now that walks you through. So the second tier of poverty schools can go on and we have someone who will help you write the grant. And then the third place is just
for the schools that are more fluent, but it just helps you get through the red tape process in a very simple way. So it's sort of a, I call it a civics class of supply and demand. I mean, no, civics is not sexy. You know, that's what I'm saying. There's nothing glamorous about this initiative, but it's useful and it's constructive and it just needs to be there. And we had no idea how much the government's like, yes, we want to spend the money. We just have to feel the need.
We have to feel, F-E-E-L, the need. And we're helping schools go better over here going, we need, but how do I show you we need you? Well, we're going to help you fill out this grant that shows them that you need it. What's it called again? Greenlight Grant Initiative. And can people go to a site and help out? Or how are you guys funded? We're still going around looking for funding now. You know, one of the challenges has been people, a lot of people come up and wanted to fund something
But they specifically wanted it to go towards their city or their state, which is a very interesting thing. We talk about, you know, this is a nonpolitical issue because it's a bipartisan bill that was passed. You still have people that go, well, I just want to put it in my backyard. It's a national campaign. If you go on the site, there are places where we can, we let you know how you can help. There are places where we take...
donations to help. It'll tell you how much that donation, what it would pay for. 18 to 25 G pays for a full grant writer to write. We have this grant writing firm that can do it by scale.
and lowered their prices to do it by scale. Seems like it would make sense for the government to just peel off a tiny sliver of that huge allocation to fund a service to lubricate it, you know, like you guys are doing. Yes. I mean, they admit that there's too much red tape. The R's and the D's admit this should not be this complicated. As we know, the government needs some help in running their business. And this is an example of a private sector going, hey, we're not going to do it for you, but...
Let's help you out. Well, they should donate to your site then. The federal government should make a little donation there and help it run. We have a solid bipartisan advisory board from Murphy to Cornyn to many others. And they'd say if we could get to 165 of the highest risk schools and get them grants written and get them awarded, that that would be a real... The Department of Education said that would be a massive game changer. And then the idea is that down the road...
you don't need to have a full grant writer write these things out that the process will be much more streamlined that you know maybe ai down the road can help fill out these grants and you don't have to pay a certain person we've also gone out if anyone out there's listen is a grant writer
and wants to do some pro bono work, please, any retired teachers out there. Give him your home phone number. Home phone number's coming up on screen right now. No, but that's a great way to do it. That's pretty great. And you're right. That is really cool. If there are any grant writers out there, please do reach out to, they can go to... Greenlightsgrantinitiative.org. You spend all this time, you do all this stuff, and you do all this amazing stuff, and giving back in this, well, not just giving back, I mean, really...
taking an initiative and helping. Sean, by the way, where was that lobster from on the G5? So that was a Maine lobster. It was, yeah, up north and just to the right. Good for you. Anyway, Matthew, you do so much good work out there in the world.
He doesn't do oysters because oysters only have pearls. He does diamonds. He does them real good. You know, here's a little peek into my personality. When you said someone writes the grants or they help write them, I felt like a weight off my shoulder, like, oh, this is another thing I don't have to do. So that's just my personality. I was like, oh, God, am I going to have to write a grant or something? But listen, so...
This is gonna, you don't have to talk about this. We can cut it. It's an old topic. But any fun theater stories. Did you ever forget a line on stage? Matthew.
No, but wait. No, it's an old topic, and forgive me. Again, we can cut it. But the only reason I'm bringing it up is because it has been a fantasy of mine. Is there... To play bongos naked? No, I have that meme. It's on repeat. But the Texas thing, will you ever revisit even the idea of Texas, or better yet, running for the president of this country or anything in politics at all? In politics. It would be amazing. Yeah.
Look, it's not something I want to visit now because of what I said earlier. I'm raising three children right now, and it's a great adventure doing that. I want to see that through. My only thing I ever knew I wanted to be was a dad since I was eight years old. I want to see that through. And I have to measure, as I've given great measurement to it, where can I be most useful?
And I want to enjoy myself. Hard work doesn't scare me. But, man, I'm an artist. I'm a storyteller. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm a folk singer. You know what I mean? Now, is those parts of me what could be useful in a political position of leadership to be a CEO of a state or a country? Maybe. But some things to, you know, raising my three kids right now is a hard but fair fight.
Going into politics right now is a hard and unfair fight. I'm trying to win. Let me go win my priority non-negotiable fair fight first and then let me out back and have a... And forgive me for asking. No, I don't mind. I just think you'd be incredible. I don't mind. I don't mind at all. It's a great answer. It is a great answer. And I think we kind of made a little bit of news. So in 10 years, you got a 10-year-old.
eight years really, you'll be on the ticket somewhere. So there we have it. Can I just say something before, because I've said this to him personally, okay? But I want to bring it up to y'all because y'all are probably closer with him and you'll know what I'm talking about. But the man in the bottom right corner who is so technically adept today and improved. Yeah.
I'm so, I've always loved him, loved him in comedy, but I was so happy to see him get into drama. Yeah. Because does anyone have a better delayed blink? Than Jason Bateman? He's got the best, Bateman's got the best delayed blink in the business. That's great. That's great.
I introduced a half blink to a character about a year ago. I did it for somebody the other night at some party. I totally forgot about it. It's like this really affected kind of – winks are super douchey anyway, but I took it up a notch for a half wink. The lids don't actually close. It's just sort of like a little encouraging squint.
Oh, it's fucking terrible. I also keep forgetting to incorporate close-eyed talking with a character. That's also super douchey. Yeah, Madonna did that. Someone closes their eyes when they talk. No, you know what? You just don't understand what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
That's a good one. But thank you, Matthew. A lot of people close them slow, but then they get nervous on the rebound and open them quick. You close them slow, and I think you open them slower. And it's right between...
I gotta hang on every word and he's absolutely fucking with me, isn't he? I think a lot of it's Xanax too, isn't it? It's a lot of Xanax. And then I'm also in the editing room, so I'm hitting freeze frames all the time just to elongate the eye close. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's crazy.
Oh, man. Got it. Well, dude. Matthew, we are over. We're eight minutes over. You're very generous. Thanks for being here. Listen, man. Yeah. Thank you for coming back. Our first returning guest. Yes. For giving me another shot with my hot head. I appreciate you. We only made it through pre-production last time. Glad to make a new production with you this time.
Yeah. What an absolute treat, man. It's so great to have you. Love you so much. Yeah. You're such a great dude. Appreciate it, guys. Appreciate it. Yeah. And all the success in your book, it comes out just because. Just because. September 12th. Am I right about that?
I think that's right. I've got the script. I don't have it over there. I'll be out there talking about it. September 12th. September 12th. September 12th. Just because Matthew McConaughey, man. You're the man. You are the man. Man, appreciate it. Okay, pal. See you next time. Thank you, pal. Thank you, bud. Thank you so much. Bless up. Bye, buddy. Love him. Real good. I tell you what, I like that Matt McConaughey. Yeah, I could talk to him. It's not Matt. It's Matthew. It's Matthew.
I made that mistake once. I felt terrible about it. I know. He talked to him for a long time. What a guy. Truly. He is an absolute original. He does not waver. He does and says what he wants. His roles have been...
all over the place from the, from the sort of the, the, the easiest go down sort of popcorn kind of films to the most challenging, uh, artistic films, small budget things. And then also just like,
I love that he lives super down home there in Texas, but then he also lives a very flamboyant and elite lifestyle as well. He's just, he figures out a way to manage it all. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, he's, but what he's been able to do in starting out is kind of a matinee idol and, and,
and sort of hanging in there, not forcing people to appreciate or respect his acting chops. You know, like he didn't cram some, you know, Shakespeare thing down our throat right after some rom-com. Like he's taking his time. What I like also is he talks about, he just shows up, he's like, for the most part, he just shows up on Friday night. That's where you can see him on a Friday night when the movie opens. And he's not out there going, talking about his process.
in this way that's self-aggrandizing. He just does it. Yeah, he just does it. But you know what I loved? I loved when he said, he's so great at everything he does that even when he was saying he was signing off, he even, it was even cool the way he waved good wishes
Bye. That's it. Just goodbye. It's not really a creative one. I don't know. You're literally saying bye. Sean always wants to get out so early. Another shot? Sean always acts like there's like a cab running out with the meter running outside. Like he's just got to get out. Maybe there is. Maybe there is. There probably is. Broadway is right outside. All right. Hey, listen. Bye. Listener, we love you. Bye. Bye. We love you, listener. We're just going to do a very simple bye. Love you. Bye. Bye.
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