Matthew McConaughey has shared a video of himself reacting to his iconic Dazed and Confused audition, having watched the clip back for the first time. Watch his response below:
McConaughey starred in the 1993 comedy as the smooth-talking and only slightly creepy big kid Wooderson - a role that he says was only ever meant to be a 'little summer job'.
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In the audition tape, we see McConaughey in character as Wooderson, pretending to be in his car with Wiley Wiggins' character Mitch, asking him for a joint.
In the next scene, he speaks to Sasha Jenson's Don Dawson about going back to college as 'that's where all the girls are'.
McConaughey smiles as he watches the clip, before saying at the end: "Nice! Look at that. So, that audition - which I've never seen - was my audition for Wooderson in Dazed and Confused."
Speaking to his past self, he adds: "You thought you might just have a little three-day job for a summer hobby. Twenty-eight years later, I've still got a little summer job that turned into a career."
In an interview with the Georgia Straight a few years back, director Richard Linklater admitted McConaughey wasn't an instant sell for the role, having worried the actor was a bit too fresh-faced - until he saw the audition, of course.
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In the end, the character was actually a combination of both Linklater's script and McConaughey's characterisation - the actor's ad libbing having even apparently spawned Wooderson's timeless 'alright, alright, alright', catchphrase.
"When I first met Matthew, he came in and he's, like, this really good-looking, clean-cut guy, and that threw me off, 'cause I never saw Wooderson like that," Linklater explained.
"I was, like, 'No, you're not right for this part.' I'm thinking this after just meeting him, and he looked at me, and he goes, 'Hey, I'm not this guy, but I know this guy. I know this guy. He's from Longview, I'm from Huntsville, these are East Texas towns. I know this guy.'
"And then he did his audition and he kind of, like, fell into this character. His eyes turned into little quarter slots - he's like, 'Hey, man, you got a joint?' And I was, like, 'Holy s***.'"
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Linklater continued: "He became that guy. Holy moley. And I always say Matthew's a character actor. I met him as a character actor.
"He was too good looking for the part, but we were long enough away from shooting that I said, 'Okay, don't cut your hair, don't shave, can you grow a moustache?' 'Well, kind of...' 'That'll be good, a sleazy kind of moustache, we're gonna add tattoos.'
"You know, we had to, kinda, grodey him up for that character. But nobody can ever say Matthew got cast because he was a pretty boy, 'cause that's not what I was looking for, for that particular part."
Featured Image Credit: YouTube/Matthew McConaugheyTopics: Entertainment, TV and Film, Celebrity, Matthew McConaughey