Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson have spent years hearing that they look alike in old photographs. Their latest press-tour wardrobe made sure nobody missed the joke.
The longtime friends walked through Manhattan on Sept. 12 wearing white T-shirts printed with younger photos of each other. Just Jared photographed Harrelson wearing McConaughey’s younger face across his chest while McConaughey did the reverse.
PEOPLE photographed the pair in New York on Sept. 10 wearing throwback pictures of one another while promoting their new Apple TV comedy, Brothers.
McConaughey and Harrelson play fictionalized versions of themselves whose lifelong friendship is upended by the possibility that they might actually share a father, turning one of the stranger unanswered questions from their real lives into an eight-episode comedy.
The T-Shirts Lean Straight Into a Real Family Mystery
Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson stepped out in NYC this weekend, wearing T-shirts with photos of each other’s younger selves printed on the front
Photos: Backgrid pic.twitter.com/nDDd3gVyOL
— JustJared.com (@JustJared) September 13, 2026
The resemblance joke existed long before the shirts. McConaughey has said his children call Harrelson “Uncle Woody,” while Harrelson’s children call him “Uncle Matthew.” Old photographs have only added to the confusion, with McConaughey saying members of each family have sometimes mistaken one actor for the other.
The possibility of an actual biological connection surfaced during a family trip to Greece. McConaughey recalled that everyone was discussing how similar the two friends were when his mother, Kay, turned to Harrelson and said she had “known” his father, Charles Harrelson, before Matthew was born.
McConaughey later said his parents were going through their second divorce around the same period that Charles Harrelson was on furlough, and there were possible places in West Texas where his mother and Harrelson’s father could have met. The question has never been settled genetically. Despite years of public discussion, neither actor has announced a DNA result establishing that they are half-brothers.
‘Brothers’ Turns the Real Rumor Into the Plot
Apple’s official description says McConaughey and Harrelson play fictionalized versions of themselves whose friendship is thrown into chaos when they uncover a decades-old secret suggesting they might actually be brothers. Vanity Fair reports that every episode opens with the phrase “Based on a true rumor.”
After Woody’s daughter’s engagement falls apart, his family heads to Matthew’s Austin ranch for an extended stay. Matthew’s mother, Ma Mac, played by Holland Taylor, then lets the possible family secret slip, sending Woody looking for answers while Matthew deals with an entirely different complication, a possible run for governor of Texas.
The eight-episode comedy premieres Sept. 23 with two episodes. New installments will then arrive each Wednesday through Nov. 4. Lee Eisenberg serves as showrunner and executive producer, while McConaughey and Harrelson both star and executive produce.
McConaughey Now Says He ‘Might Need to’ Take the DNA Test
The press tour has brought the real question back alongside its fictional version, and McConaughey still has not completely resolved how much he wants to know.
During a September appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, he revisited his mother’s comment and acknowledged that Harrelson has always been more willing to believe the theory. McConaughey remains skeptical. “I don’t think it’s true,” he told Fallon. But when the conversation returned to finally resolving the question with DNA, he added, “But, yeah, I might need to.”
That hesitation has been consistent. Harrelson told Stephen Colbert in 2023 that he wanted to take the test, while recognizing that McConaughey had considerably more at stake. For Harrelson, an unexpected result could mean gaining another brother, but for McConaughey, it could change what he had believed about his father, James Donald McConaughey, for his entire life.
They Were Playing Brothers Long Before ‘Brothers’
Whatever a DNA test might eventually show, McConaughey and Harrelson’s connection has already lasted decades. Vanity Fair says the pair became friends while making the 1999 comedy EDtv, in which they appropriately played brothers Ed and Ray Pekurny.
Their relationship continued offscreen as their families became close, and they reunited professionally in 2014 for the first season of HBO’s True Detective. Their performances as Rust Cohle and Marty Hart earned both men Emmy nominations and turned their easy offscreen rapport into one of television’s most recognizable acting partnerships.