THE STORY – Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson might be linked by something more than just friendship.
THE CAST – Matthew McConaughey, Woody Harrelson, Lisa Gilroy, Holland Taylor, Dax Shepard, Brian Williams, Brittany Ishibashi, Highdee Kuan, Natalie Martinez, Oona Yaffe, Ella Grace Helton, Nolan Almeida
THE TEAM – Matthew McConaughey, Woody Harrelson, David West Read, Lee Eisenberg
Ever had the thought, “Matthew McConaughey should have his own reality show?” Well, alright, alright, alright, now’s your lucky day, because he’s finally (kinda) done it. Based on a true rumor, McConaughey teams up with his spiritual – and possibly actual – brother, Woody Harrelson, for this rambunctious ride of two famous best friends who discover there might actually be a truth to those “are they related” rumors after all. There are pockets of network family sitcom that poke through, but McConaughey and Harrelson are a rowdy, fun time filled with enough laugh-out-loud moments in every episode to make it worth a trip down south. It’s a lot of dad humor, a lot of Texas, and a lot of fun.
Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson play heightened, not-so-fictionalized versions of themselves: still famous actors, lifelong best friends, and proud Texans, although Harrelson has decamped to the affluent hippie enclave of Malibu. That life-of-leisure setup comes crashing down when Harrelson, fleeing his family’s problems, piles his wife and two daughters into their RV and sets off across the country, unannounced, to his real-life best friend’s home in Texas. McConaughey and his wife, three kids, and larger-than-life mother, Ma Mac (played by the outrageously funny Holland Taylor), find themselves in a wealthier version of Clark Griswold’s nightmare when his own Cousin Eddie parks on his lawn. As if an uninvited house guest weren’t enough, McConaughey is also contemplating a run for governor. Their lifelong friendship is thrown into chaos when they uncover a decades-old secret: they might actually be brothers. Sound absurd? Well, truth is stranger than fiction, lending co-creators McConaughey, Harrelson, Lee Eisenberg, and David West Read a high-concept true story ripe for mining its inherent absurdity, warmth, and sheer comedic potential.
A fear going into the series was that it might inadvertently inspire even more celebrities to run for public office, or that this was a test run for McConaughey’s own campaign. We’ve reached our quota at the highest office in the country, thank you very much, and let’s just say there’s plenty of room for improvement when it comes to electing candidates with actual qualifications. The show rightly avoids the party-politics debate, framing McConaughey as the independent Texan everyman with the money, power, and right morals to fix Texas. He just wants outsiders and insiders to love the state he’s known and loved for five generations. It’s a noble effort, if not sanctimonious, but it doesn’t layer on the political aspirations too thick.
The entire premise hinges on Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson’s chemistry and comedy, and is the series’s selling point and strength. Upon first glance, McConaughey and Harrelson are cut from the same southern cloth. But the pilot episode focuses on establishing how different these two famous Texans really are. Harrelson is the type-B, go-with-the-flow foil to McConaughey’s straight-laced, uptight man with ambitions bigger than a longhorn. He’s the QB of the football team and the class president to Harrelson’s hippie beach bum who can’t make or follow a plan to save his life. McConaughey in particular has a number of callbacks to his most famous roles (he delightfully does “The Wolf of Wall Street” chest beat again), nodding to his storied career.
McConaughey is also, perhaps most famously, known for his rhythmic storytelling, akin to an Evangelist preacher, and in “Brothers” he lets it fly. Those long vowels turn a one-syllable word into an open vowel, never knowing when it’ll ehh-yend. The schtick gets a little old at times, particularly in a few episodes in the middle of the season, but if you prefer listening to the audiobook version of Greenlights, you’ll enjoy it. The long takes of a Lincoln must’ve been in McConaughey’s contract, too, a bit distractingly so. Meanwhile, Harrelson takes his laid-back persona and amps it up to a hilarious degree. While all of us type-A perfectionists look on with horror and a little bit of envy, Harrelson is cool as a cucumber, smoking a joint and wondering what all the fuss is about. Together, McConaughey and Harrelson are a riot, and you’ll be thankful they let you in to the party.
The rest of the cast is stacked with supporting and guest actors that amp up the hilarity, most notably Holland Taylor as Ma Mac, Matthew’s overbearing mother. Taylor fully transforms into the role, orange spray tan, pink lipstick and all. She nails not only the southern lady yellow-blonde aesthetic of her real-life counterpart, but lets the embodiment of her muse take over. Taylor’s combination of sass and twang lets us know she’s having an absolute ball, and we should all join her. And while Taylor is an absolute hoot, another performance risks eclipsing them all: Lisa Gilroy as the foul-mouthed, demanding, hysterically funny campaign manager. As established in our review of season 2 of “The Paper,” Lisa Gilroy is a comedic superstar. So when she appears in the second episode of “Brothers” as a potential campaign manager, Gwen, you can’t help but feel delight. She (of course) nails the role as the unflappable, relentless woman trying to rein in the guys’ hijinks; the Jen Barkley to the male Leslie Knope, but with sharper timing.
Unfortunately, the series is too lean in its writing of each family. The wives are sidelined for much of the season, with only a supporting line or two from each husband. And there are a few B and C plots involving one or two of the kids, but the characters aren’t fleshed out enough to make it as compelling as anything involving Harrelson or McConaughey directly. You’ll also find Skyler Gisondo as Harrelson’s daughter’s sad-sack ex, Dax Shepard as himself, and Jeff Kober as the bad guy. Come for Matthew and Woody’s adventures; stay for the friends. While the season is a tight eight episodes, the series could have lent itself a hand by developing richer supporting characters.
The production itself is a high-quality Apple TV output, if not a little too polished. Filmed on location in Austin, it captures a sweeping sense of scale, with expansive visual richness in every scene. There’s some incredible costume and makeup work done by Colin Wilkes, Gary Archer, Chris Clark, and Nancy Rankin Escovedo in the series’ fourth episode, reminiscent of Michèle Burke’s work in “Tropic Thunder,” which was the exact inspiration. If you close your eyes, the score (by music composer Kristen Higuera) will transport you to a dive bar in the middle of nowhere, where you’d be nodding your head and tapping your toes while sipping on your 3rd beer and munching on a basket of onion rings. In short, straight bangers.
The series truly feels like two best buds getting into some absurd, middle-aged sitcom-esque hijinks. And while the star leads play exaggerated versions of themselves, there’s still a lot of heart at their core. It wouldn’t be a surprise to learn that several scenes were just McConaughey and Harrelson riffing off each other, akin to “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” McConaughey and Harrelson are having a ball, and they’ve finally invited us to join, even if it follows familiar beats too often.
THE GOOD – McConaughey, Harrelson, Taylor, and Gilroy are all a hilarious riot. An absurd concept that has some genuine, laugh-out-loud moments.
THE BAD – A bit too network-sitcom at times, with underdeveloped supporting characters.
THE EMMY PROSPECTS – Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series, Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series, Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series
THE FINAL SCORE – 7/10
