Long before Matthew McConaughey was winning Oscars and using his iconic phrase “alright, alright, alright,” he was losing a brutal war against acne.
The Hollywood heartthrob, 56, revealed his culprit wasn’t junk food or bad habits — but rather a facial product that his mother, Mary Kathleen “Kay” McConaughey, was selling at the time called Oil of Mink, which was hailed as a miracle for skin impurities.
“At the same time, I was entering adolescence — you know, pubic hair growing in, balls dropping, voice lowering, and a few pimples,” McConaughey shared in a new Lyrics of Livin newsletter posted via YouTube on Friday, February 6.
“A fan of self-regard and looking my best, I listened to her and started applying Oil of Mink to my face each night before bed. The result?… More pimples.”
Matthew McConaughey back in 2000. (Photo by Chris Weeks/Liaison)
Despite expressing his concerns to his mom, McConaughey took her advice and continued using the product, slathering it on for another 12 days. And like clockwork, the acne spread so Mary, now 94, reached out to her boss, Elaine, to check out his “swollen, zit-infested face.”
Elaine claimed everything looked fine, telling him, “It’s bringing out all the impurities!” She said something along the lines of, “Just keep applying the Oil of Mink each night, and eventually it’ll pull all the impurities out, and then you’ll have a clear, glowing complexion for the rest of your life.”
The actor felt more assured that he’d eventually have flawless skin so he was not yet at the point of ditching the product — especially after Elaine’s remarks.
However, “three weeks in, my entire cheeks were swollen, red pustules. Huge whiteheads. Blistering geysers of pus. I looked like a different person,” he admitted.
That’s when he finally sought out a medical opinion, paying a visit to his dermatologist. When his doctor saw the large cysts on his face, he asked McConaughey what he’d been using.
After McConaughey’s product reveal, his dermatologist replied, “This is for people that are at least over 40 years old, definitely not for a teenager going through adolescence when your skin is secreting more oil. This product has completely blocked your pores.”
“You have severe nodular acne,” the doctor added. “You are 10 days away from having ice-pick scars in your cheeks for the rest of your life.”
McConaughey was put on Accutane as a result, which caused him to deal with severely dry skin, peeling and cracking lips, tight joints, as well as hair loss and headaches.
When he informed his father, James Donald McConaughey, of what happened, James suggested they take legal action against Oil of Mink for his suffering. James pulled out a recorder and asked him about his confidence, if it impacted his relationship “with the girls” and more.
Two years later, he was pimple-free thanks to the Accutane and it was time to go into a deposition with the defense attorney representing Oil of Mink. The D.A. seemingly sympathized with McConaughey before pulling out the star’s high school yearbook from 1988.
He pointed to a photo of McConaughey, which read “Most Handsome.”
“We were done. Case dropped. My dad was inconsolable. He went on about it for weeks,” McConaughey said. (James died in 1992 at the age of 62.)
As for what his dad griped about, McConaughey fondly remembered he said, “Goddamn you, boy! Here I am, I got a chance to make $35 to 50 thousand dollars on a lawsuit that we coulda won! And you gotta go off and win ‘Most Handsome’! You screwed up the whole lawsuit, son!”
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