Background and career
Matthew David McConaughey ( mə-KON-ə-hay; born November 4, 1969) is an American actor. He achieved his breakthrough with a supporting performance in the coming-of-age comedy Dazed and Confused (1993). After a number of supporting roles, his first success as a leading man came in the legal drama A Time to Kill (1996). His career progressed with lead roles in the science fiction film Contact (1997), the historical drama Amistad (1997), and the war film U-571 (2000).
In the 2000s, McConaughey became known for starring in romantic comedies, including The Wedding Planner (2001), How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days (2003), Failure to Launch (2006), Fool's Gold (2008), and Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (2009), establishing him as a sex symbol. In 2011, after a two-year hiatus from film acting, McConaughey began to appear in more dramatic roles, beginning with the legal drama The Lincoln Lawyer. In 2012, he gained wider praise for his roles as a stripper in Magic Mike and a fugitive in Mud.
McConaughey's portrayal of Ron Woodroof, a cowboy diagnosed with AIDS, in the biopic Dallas Buyers Club (2013) earned him widespread critical acclaim and numerous accolades, including the Academy Award for Best Actor. He followed it with a supporting role in The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), and a starring role as Rust Cohle in the first season of HBO's crime anthology series True Detective (2014), for which he was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series. His subsequent film roles include starring in Interstellar (2014) and The Gentlemen (2019), as well as voice work in Kubo and the Two Strings (2016), Sing (2016), and Sing 2 (2021).
Matthew David McConaughey was born on November 4, 1969, in Uvalde, Texas. He has Irish heritage, particularly from the County Cavan/County Monaghan area. His mother, Mary Kathleen (née McCabe), a published author and a former kindergarten teacher, was from Trenton, New Jersey. His father, James Donald McConaughey, also had Irish roots. He was born in Mississippi in 1929 and raised in Louisiana where he ran an oil pipe supply business; he played for the Kentucky Wildcats and the Houston Cougars college football teams. Jim was selected by the Green Bay Packers of the National Football League (NFL) in the 27th round of the 1953 NFL draft. He was released before the season began and never played an official league game in the NFL. McConaughey's parents married each other three times, having divorced each other twice. He has two older brothers, Michael and Patrick (who was adopted). Michael, nicknamed "Rooster", is a millionaire who starred in the CNBC docu-series West Texas Investors Club. The family were Methodists. He is a relative of Confederate brigadier general Dandridge McRae.
How Matthew McConaughey makes money
Dazed and Confused was released on September 24, 1993, in 183 theaters, grossing $918,127 on its opening weekend. It went on to make $7.9 million in North America.
Sources
Net-worth figure: Celebrity Net Worth (2026-09-18), in USD. Biography and career facts: the person's Wikipedia article and linked reporting. Snapshot date for all StarWorth figures: 28 October 2026.
