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Matthew McConaughey on Surfer, Dude
By Fred Topel | Image property of Anchor Bay Entertainment
Matthew McConaughey has had his own production company for a while. J.K. Livin' represents his personal philosophy to keep moving. Their first production is Surfer, Dude, the story of a surfer forced to participate in a reality show when the beaches calm down leaving no waves for surfing. The surfer dude doesn't quite see why he needs to engage in this corporate idea.
McConaughey the Surfer Dude
"In his mind, what would you need to raise money for?" said McConaughey. "I mean, it's free, there's a wave, I've got a board, I've got the ability to stand up on it and go surf. He just got this gravy train cush situation, where he's a good enough surfer, and a cool enough dude that he can call his sponsors and say, 'I'm going to be at this point today,' he goes surfs, they come out and take pictures of him, someone buys those pictures. That puts change in his pocket, he pays the rent and eats food and they fly him where he wants to go surf. That's all he wants. Then that little simple thing, that he thought was sort of free, was taken away from him and he's landlocked. He can't fly where he wants to go surf, because the guy who now holds and writes his checks wants him to do some other things that he's not really down with."
The film is not a condemnation of corporations or reality TV, rather an exploration of a simple lifestyle. "His attitude's incredibly simple. That's what I admire about him, how simple he is. I'm much more ambitious than him, but that was our point, to give this really simple country soul, a natural character, put him in a unnatural world that he was forced to be in because he couldn't go to the thing that he loved. And we loved having a guy that doesn't get up on his soapbox and say, 'Reality TV's bad.' He's saying, 'Not feeling it.' It's about as simple and pure of a creed as you can have. It's a luxury to be able to have that creed. Either you're feeling it or you're not."
 Surfer, Dude
The film may be about simplicity, but getting it produced was not. "I love the producer role. So much so that I know that I don't want to do it for every film I'm o. It's hard but the reason I got into it was I wanted to have my hands in the clay. As an actor, I'm an actor for hire, I show up, day one, if I'm number one on the call sheet, I work say maybe three months on most films, then I'm off. I don't get another call for eight months until they say, 'Hey, will you come sell it?' As producer, there's years of work beforehand. Production was only 28 days on this one, and then there's been a year of work, everyday, since then. So as a producer, I've got to have my hands in everything, and I've gained invaluable experience. It was like being back in film school in a lot of ways, back in Texas, and everybody in our company got that too."
McConaughey took up surfing two year ago in preparation for the film, but still left the big curls to the pros. "Again, this is not your typical surf flick. This is about the waves going away. Like all those surf shots, did you like those? Did you like those? Did you know I could surf that good? That's not me. No, that's not me. That's a guy, Keith Malloy who doubled me. He's the guy who makes me look like a great surfer. I have a couple shots in there where that's me surfing but most of that's Keith Malloy. That was a great double and he's a guy who also lives a life that sort of agrees with the philosophies that we have in this film. Luckily his body type's similar to mine so he could double for me."
Surfer, Dude is out in theaters now.
For the trailer and more movie info, go to the Surfer, Dude Movie Page.
Fred Topel
Sources: Image property of Anchor Bay Entertainment
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