Greenlights

Matthew McConaughey is an interesting actor. Typecast as a rom-com actor, in recent years he has stepped away from those films into more gritty roles that have showcased his skills as an actor and proven that there’s more to the man than first glimpsed.      McConaughey has recently turned 50 and he felt it was time to tell his story. At the beginning of the book he lists things that have happened in his life. His mother and father were twice divorced and three times married, to each other. He was whipped until his butt bled for putting on a Cracker Jack tattoo when he was 10. He was always the first one to wear out the knees on his jeans. He had 78 stitches sewn into his forehead by a vet. He drummed on bongos while naked until he was arrested by the police. You can see this biography is not your normal run-of-the-mill Hollywood expose.      Throughout the book he flags his moments of greenlights. These are signs for him that tell him to go ahead, proceed, carry on. He says you can catch more greenlights in life through skill, consideration, and intent, among other things. And you can catch more greenlights by identifying where the red lights are and then changing course to hit fewer of them.      Growing up with parents who had a combative and robust relationship made McConaughey resilient. And he had to be. He got his first ‘ass whupping’ by his mother after he answered to Matt on the kindergarten playground. She screamed at him, ‘You weren’t named after a doormat!’ But as he says, ‘We may not have always liked each other, but we always loved each other. We hug and kiss and wrestle and fight.’ He grew up tough but loving, he worked hard and liked to grift, he was a hustler. And, as he says, that has led to many adventures in his life.      He talks about his escapades as a child, coming to live in Australia for a period as a young man, how he fell into acting and how it then became a career, how he eventually escaped being typecast, meeting his soulmate and falling in love, having children.      Throughout the book are snippets of his poetry, short essays and thoughts as well as bumper sticker style quotes that look like post-it notes taped to the page. All of this makes it feel more like a journal.      McConaughey has a strong voice. You can hear him speaking in your head as you read. He is raw, full of honesty and authentic. As you read, you feel you are sitting with him for a fireside chat over a drink.      There were times I found his snippets of wisdom and his tone in the book a bit evangelistic and over the top for me. He lives and writes at full throttle. But I did laugh and, at times, I cringed, but I couldn’t help but be impressed as to how he has lives life to the absolute fullest, always with his eye on the ball. Reviewed by Rowena Morcom