Actor, producer, model, writer and director Matthew McConaughey, born in 1969, first gained notice for his breakout role in the coming of age comedy "Dazed and Confused" in 1993. In the 2000s he became best known for starring in romantic comedies like the film "The Wedding Planner" in 2001, "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" in 2003 and "Failure to Launch" in 2006.

After 2011, he acted in more dramatic roles in films such as "The Lincoln Lawyer," "Killer Joe," "The Wolf of Wall Street" and "Interstellar."

In 2013 McConaughey portrayed Ron Woodroof, a cowboy diagnosed with AIDS, in "Dallas Buyers Club," which earned him an Academy Award. McConaughey has been married to Brazilian model and designer Camila Alves since 2012.

Daily Sabah conducted an interview with McConaughey on his career, lifestyle and family life.

DAILY SABAH: Instead of going to film school you almost went to law school. What was your interest in law?

MATTHEW MCCONAUGHEY: That's what I was going to be, a criminal defense attorney. I've played a few attorneys. And I'm glad I didn't go to law school, I prefer what I do now because I get to go act like a lawyer for a few months and then quit and go do something else. But it was at a time when there was the black sheep family side of my family that was a joke like, "Go be a lawyer, then you can defend us in court." But then it was my own personal sense of justice and injustice at that time. It was the time when Steve Biko was in South Africa being held and I was keeping up with that case. And my instincts always went to defend, not prosecute. And I could hold up, I was in debates a lot in school and I was really good at debating and defending someone. And quite literally every sport I played, I played a defender. When I played baseball I played catcher, when I played soccer I played goalie. And so instinctually I was literally in sports playing only defenders and I only put that together a couple of years ago. But instinctually, any case that I would read up on national, international, state, I would always instinctually feel like, "Oh, I could win the defense." And so that was my interest in going to law school.

DS: Your latest films "White Boy Rick" and "Serenity" are about the struggle between right and wrong. How do you find your inner compass?

MM: I think daily I'm pretty good with it, with a good measure of my own center, right and wrong. Sometimes you have to commit one wrong to keep a thousand wrongs from happening. And it's relative to a lifelong question for all of us. I think for me, if I've got a big decision to make, I've got a real moral compass of a choice to make, I try to just go find some time on my own to where I'm not thinking about it, where the answer can sort of fall on me and I'll see what I'm comfortable with. I also practice this a lot in my process of making decisions, "I'll say yes, this the decision I'm going to make an I'll live with that for a week and I'll see if it wakes me up in the middle of the night and I'm not comfortable with it." Or I am comfortable with it. Then I'll go or I'm going to say no and I'll live with that for a week. And I measure how I felt in both of those times. The time I said, yes, I want to do this, did it wake me up in the middle of night? So try to give myself some time to measure.


McConaughey is married with three children.

DS: How was your relationship with your father?

I had a good relationship with my dad. I'm the youngest of three. I got older brothers. Business became very successful; the oil business in Texas became very successful when I was younger. So we moved when I was 10, so he was on the road a lot more because business was good and he was on the road salesman. I've been covering salesman. So the high school years I didn't spend as much time with him but then I did get to spend actually a really great a year, two years with him actually, right before he passed away, which was five days into the shooting and my first film "Dazed and Confused." But I had a reverence for him. He taught us. If there was something that I could rely on that was above any other mortal thing in the world, he was that backbone.

DS: What are some of the lessons that your dad taught you that you're passing onto your kids?

I think self-reliance is very important, was important to my father and it is important to me as a father to pass on to my children. Also one of the things my dad would always teach, teach all of his boys was "you never say can't." The the time I said can't in front of him I got in big trouble. That was like the one of the worst cuss words, can't and hate. If you said can't or hate you were in big trouble.

DS: You've worked with a lot of great directors, on the flip side of that, is there a common trait among the bad directors?

Good question. I'm not calling them bad directors, I'm going to say let me compliment the good ones and shine a light on what a not-so-good director might do. The most powerful and creative word that a director can use for an actor, to get what they want, is to say "yes" to the actor. That's what we want. We would come in prepared, we come in and we come up with an idea. It's not just picking it out of left field. I've been working on this, this means something. And so if the directors give me a chance to go express what I'm wanting to do, I'm much more open when he or she throws out.

So another thing is if it's going well, if the scene's going well and the acting's right on, directors will feel that nudge, feel like I got to go get in there. I got to go direct; I got to go say something. If it's going well, sit back and let it roll and go. Yes, keep throwing gas on that fire. Keep watering what's going yes, don't go, don't go infiltrate yourself to get in the way just because you feel like you got to say something if it's going well. Because there's going to be days when it's not and we do need to pow wow and get in there and figure it out because it's not going so well.

The other thing is to have the confidence to let some magic happen, which is hard because you got a schedule; you've got to keep moving. Come on we need to get this. And we really don't have time to do more than three takes. But I have to give everyone time to feel relaxed on the set enough to let some magic happen and then to be able to see it and use it. That's what a good director will do.

DS: "White Boy Rick" is based on true story of a blue collar father and his teenage son Rick, who becomes an undercover police informant and later a drug dealer to have a better life and break the cycle of poverty. Do you feel both of them were victims of society or victims of the system?

Let me say this to speak to what I know that speaks specifically to Rick, who I did spend quite a bit of time with. One of the refreshing things about him, almost surprising, was he doesn't play the victim card at all. I've met many people in prison and 99 out of 100 say they're innocent. Rick is not one of those. He's like, "No, I was no choirboy. No, I did this." But I didn't do it to the extent in the level that they portrayed me doing it. When I spoke to him, he was standing here. "I've been in prison for 27 years. That math does not add up to the crime committed. Even if I was as big of a criminal as they made me out to be, which I was not." So, part of what is strong about him is one as continuous sense of humor. He's not in denial of what he did, didn't do or the circumstances he's in. He's just like, "Look, me and every single other person in this prison, nobody thinks I should be in here as long as I've been in here. I'm just asking everyone else on the outside to have a look. And so I can maybe get a pardon," which he did.

DS: Can you fathom allowing your kids to take this road that this man allows his son to take?

I hear you. No, frankly I cannot fathom it. I can understand it. I was born in different circumstances of my life, the life my kids have different circumstances. That's the point of where this father I played could not tow the line. At the very beginning he lets his daughter leave. A good dad doesn't let her go out the door. He then goes in collusion with his son, doing something that he knows he shouldn't be doing but what he was doing on his own wasn't working so he allows it. One of the first things that struck me was this is one of those fathers, and I know quite a few of them, that want to be best friends with their children, and that's not always a great recipe for being a good parent. And he is also a single parent, he's trying. The guy's heart is in the right place, that's for sure, but he can't tow the line.

DS: How multicultural is your house, from the food you eat to how you watch TV?

It's a pretty multicultural house. There's a lot of Portuguese spoken, there's a pot of beans on the stove, mostly. Our musical tastes that we listen to nightly change everything to Jorge Ben down to some AC/DC that I'll put on. The kids are dual citizens and we try to get back and spend as much time as we can back there with my wife's family in Brazil. And they all speak better Portuguese; my children can speak better than I do. And there's always, usually another family member, whether it's someone from my wife's side or my side, weekly, around the house.