This article is an excerpt from the Shortform book guide to "Greenlights" by Matthew McConaughey. Shortform has the world's best summaries and analyses of books you should be reading.
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Who are Matthew McConaughey’s parents? How did their relationship affect McConaughey’s upbringing?
Matthew McConaughey’s parents were both tough, opinionated people, and they had a tumultuous relationship. While this was difficult on McConaughey growing up, he came to accept them for who they were.
Read more about Matthew McConaughey’s parents below.
Matthew McConaughey’s Parents, Jim and Kay
Jim McConaughey, Matthew’s father, came from Patterson, Mississippi, and grew up in Louisiana. His three sons—Mike, Pat, and Matthew—saw him as a bastion of common sense and wanted to emulate his work ethic, traditional manners (sir, ma’am), and loyalty. Jim loved drinking beer, telling stories, and hosting parties. He valued hard work over flashy appearances. He had a big, commanding personality and a soft spot for underdogs, and dreamed of “making it big” and “striking it rich”—he’d been an athlete who was briefly drafted to the NFL with the Green Bay Packers. Professionally, he worked in the oil industry.
Kay McConaughey, Matthew’s mother, came from Altoona, Pennsylvania, but always claimed she was from Trenton, New Jersey, on the grounds that nobody would want to be from someplace called “Altoona.” She was tough, aggressive, and opinionated, and she never carried any stress because she always forgave herself immediately. She had a difficult upbringing, and Matthew says this gave her a powerful drive to make up her own reality and deny anything she didn’t like (as in her claim that she was from Trenton). According to Matthew, this power of denial was one of Kay’s strengths. For example, it apparently helped her defeat two different kinds of cancer without receiving professional medical treatment.
Jim and Kay were together as a couple for a very long time before they got married. When they finally did take the plunge, it was because Kay handed Jim an invitation to their own wedding and told him he had 24 hours to decide.
It was a difficult relationship. Although they loved each other passionately, over the years they divorced and remarried each other twice. As two equally strong-willed people, when they argued, they did so vigorously and sometimes physically. On four separate occasions, Jim broke Kay’s middle finger when she stuck it in his face.One night, Jim came home from work and soon got into an enormous fight with Kay when she kept calling him fat. This so enraged him that he upended the kitchen table, after which she went to call the police but instead ended up breaking his nose with the telephone and then brandishing a kitchen knife at him. For his part, Jim, nose still bleeding, kept flinging ketchup on Kay from a bottle as he circled her like a matador calling out, “Touché!” After they had released their rage, Kay started crying, and suddenly they embraced in the middle of the kitchen, fell to the floor, and made love. A red light in their marriage had turned green. It was a cycle of fighting and reuniting that Matthew and his brothers knew well. Today, Matthew says this tumultuous way of being together, which might seem shocking to other people, was simply the way his parents loved each other.
Matthew McConaughey’s parents had a difficult relationship, which was undoubtedly hard for him. Eventually he was able to accept them for who they were and appreciate the lessons they taught him.
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Like what you just read? Read the rest of the world's best book summary and analysis of Matthew McConaughey's "Greenlights" at Shortform .
Here's what you'll find in our full Greenlights summary :
- How "greenlights" help you confirm if you're on the right path
- How McConaughey switched college choices because of family finances
- Why family is at the center of everything for McConaughey, no matter what's happening in his career
