Matthew McConaughey Joins Instagram on His 50th Birthday

Matthew McConaughey turns 50 years old on Nov. 4, and to celebrate, the actor is joining Instagram. McConaughey arrived on the social media platform with a video explaining what he hoped visitors would get out of his page, explaining that he’s ready to share his true self with fans.

“When people come to my page, I want them to see me,” he said. “This is my first venture into sharing myself and my views with the world, and I’m a little bit nervous about it because, quite frankly, I know I wanna have a monologue, I’m not sure I wanna have the dialogue. But, I’ve learned that you’ve gotta have the dialogue to have the monologue, just as you have to have a monologue to have the dialogue. So I’m looking forward to it. I’m looking forward to sharing who I am with you.”

“I’m looking forward to seeing if who I am translates, if what I want to share translates,” he continued. “If it tickles your funny bone, if it makes you think a second, makes your heart swell up a little bit. If it makes you take a quiet moment for a walk and go, ‘I gotta check in with M and the E.’ Hopefully all those things. Let’s have some fun with it though, and let’s keep the high eye, not the low eye. High eye.”

The clip was simply captioned, “officially mcconaughey,” which also happens to be the actor’s Instagram handle. He received a warm welcome from the University of Texas Longhorns and the University of Texas at Austin, who wrote, “Happy birthday, Professor McConaughey and welcome to Instagram.” McConaughey is an alum of the university who previously taught as a visiting instructor and officially joined the faculty this year, teaching a filmmaking class during the fall semester.

McConaughey’s Instagram bio declares him a “Husband. Father. Actor. Minister of Culture. Professor. Creative Director. AustinFC. JKLivin. Pickle Expert,” and his profile picture is of the star in a white button-down shirt, jeans, belt buckle and a cowboy hat with a hands-free microphone on. He has over 40,000 followers as of Monday afternoon and the number will only increase as the hours go on. McConaughey is also following his wife, Camila Alves, and around 30 famous friends including Dwayne Johnson, Jimmy Fallon, Zac Efron and Drew Brees.

Photo Credit: Getty / Gabriel Olsen