Words: Harry Shukman
Matthew McConaughey is such a big deal in his hometown that they invite him to commentate on American college football games. He lives in Austin, home of the Texas Longhorns, a university team who play in a stadium with capacity for 100,000 spectators. Once in a while, they bring him in to coach the players. When McConaughey spoke to the team in 2014, he drawled encouragement and sporting platitudes. But now that he is mulling a run for Governor of Texas, it sounds like the beginnings of a stump speech.
“I was gonna ask you all, man, why do you play football?” he says in front of an army of enormous young men. “Ask yourself when you look in the mirror tonight, ‘why do I play this game? Why am I out here, bustin’ my ass in the middle of the heat, every day?’ It feels good going out on Saturdays when it’s the big show, right? Hell yeah, it does. It feels much better after a W than it does after an L. I’ve found that when I’ve done my best work as an actor, it was only when I pushed myself to be better than I even thought I could be.” And he’s off talking about motivation, playing for yourself as well as for your teammates. The players – and even the coaches – are hanging on his every word.
Governor McConaughey? It’s not such an outrageous idea. The 51-year-old actor, whose roles have seen him play a stoner, a drug-addled detective, and a Rhodes-scholar crime boss, not to mention countless six-packed rom com hunks, would not be the first Hollywood star to successfully move into politics. Arnold Schwarzenegger made his name playing the lead in schlocky sci-fi movies before serving two terms as the Governor of California. McConaughey has starred in a few dud pictures in his career, but if Arnie could swing California after playing Mr Freeze in Batman and Robin (“Ice to see you!”) then anything is possible.
Still, mainstream popularity rarely translates to success at the ballot box. Other than Donald Trump, Ronald Reagan, and the WWE wrestler Jesse “The Body” Ventura, who was the 38th Governor of Minnesota, A-list electoral campaigns tend to end in embarrassing defeat. Caitlyn Jenner was one of the latest celebs to run in the gubernatorial race in California – but she tanked. Cynthia Nixon, who played Miranda in Sex and the City, challenged Andrew Cuomo as Governor of New York in the 2018 election – and also lost. Kanye West, founder of the Birthday Party ran a slapdash bid for President in 2020, getting just 60,000 votes.
Other celebrity political runs have been less successful…
It could be that celebs who set their sights on smaller electoral stages fare better. Clint Eastwood served a term as the Mayor of Carmel, a seaside town in northern California, having won in a landslide in 1986. Glenn Jacobs, better known as the wrestler Kane, whose signature finishing move was the “Tombstone Piledriver”, became the Mayor of Knox County, Tennessee by a comfortable margin. He is pursuing a second term.
That might be the lesson running through the mind of Shaquille O’Neal, the 7ft 1 giant considered one of the greatest NBA players of all time. He is thinking about running for a sheriff position in 2024 – a local policing role that residents elect. “This is not about politics,” he told an interviewer. “This is about bringing people closer together. You know, when I was coming up, people loved and respected the police, the deputies. And, I want to be the one to bring that back, especially in the community I serve.”
Other stars have floated their names as potential presidential candidates, as a way of testing the waters. There was a brief buzz about whether Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, a wrestling contemporary of Kane, would put his name forward in the 2020 general election. Political consultants formed a campaign committee in 2017 to sound out Johnson’s future career. One of Hollywood’s most bankable stars – and People magazine’s sexiest man alive of 2016 – he has told reporters that he is “seriously considering” a presidential run.
Johnson became known as an “industrial strength patriot” after the death of Osama Bin Laden, when he tweeted: “Just got word that will shock the world—Land of the free…home of the brave DAMN PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN!” Johnson is registered as an independent, having spoken at both Democratic and Republican party conventions. “I’d like to see a better leadership,” he has said. “I’d like to see a greater leadership.” In 2017, he had stronger favourability ratings than Trump. A poll this year found that 46 per cent of Americans would consider voting for The Rock. “I do have that goal to unite our country,” he told an interviewer, “and I also feel that if this is what the people want, then I will do that.” Which is what politicians always say right before they launch an election bid.
These are the kind of rumblings that are coming from Camp McConaughey. Back in March, he said a run for Governor of Texas was “a true consideration”. Greg Abbott, the current Republican Governor of Texas who won his last election by a margin of a million votes, will seek a third term in 2022, which could mean McConaughey faces a difficult race.
Karl Rove, senior adviser to George W. Bush and experienced practitioner of the political dark arts, suggested that a McConaughey run would be “improbable, but it’s not out of the question”. Other strategists have suggested that McConaughey’s profile exceeds that of any WWE wrestler and could enjoy a real boost from fans.
McConaughey sounds determined to carve out a place for himself in politics. “I’m looking into it now again, what is my leadership role?” he said. “Because I do think I have some things to teach and share, and what is my role? What’s my category in my next chapter of life that I’m going into?” Politico reports that he has been ringing up the kingmakers of Texan politics – CEOs and moderate Republicans – to see whether they like the idea of his name on the ballot paper. If he gets elected in 2022, what next? A Hollywood showdown in 2032 between The Rock and Matthew McConaughey? Sounds like a good idea for a movie…
Read next: The Many Lives of Matthew McConaughey
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