Matthew McConaughey recently joined Woody Harrelson and Ted Danson’s podcast “Where Everybody Knows Your Name.” During the episode, Harrelson recalled that while filming Season 1 of True Detective, he wanted to punch McConaughey “many times” because of his method acting.
“He’s good at it,” Harrelson said. “During filming, he was the last call. There were many times when I wanted to punch this son of a bitch in the face. I was so mad at him because he was the character.”
McConaughey explained that he had to be “stoic” between takes to stay in his character’s head.
“We were sitting there, we were about to start filming, and we were rehearsing,” McConaughey recalled. “I’m a little stoic Rust Cole. Woody’s like, ‘Hey, I want to talk to you about something.'” He said, “The way you and I work, McConaughey, I’ll hit you the ball, you’ll hit it back, I’ll hit the ball back to you.” We volley and play around. … Hey hey, that’s us. It’s dramatic, but it’s also comedic.”
In HBO’s “True Detective,” Harrelson and McConaughey play two Southern detectives tracking a serial killer in the esoteric interior of Louisiana. At one point, Harrelson thought the show was too dark and suggested McConaughey add a joke during production.
He said, “I remember saying to[McConaughey]before we started filming, I was like, ‘Hey, people are going to expect you to laugh with us. We’ve got to get some jokes in here.'” He was like, “Hmm.” I’m waiting for him to say. He just said, “Hmm, yeah.”
Season 1 of “True Detective” won five Emmy Awards and is still widely considered one of the best shows in HBO’s catalog. Despite their enduring popularity, Harrelson recently told Today that there was “no chance” that he and McConaughey would return to “True Detective.”
“To be fair, never. There’s no chance,” Harrelson said. “Because the result was great. I like how it turned out. If anything, I think doing another season would taint it.”
