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U) MOVIES
IN POSSESSION
Matthew McCon·
aughey(l;jand
Matthew Fox
play coaches
struggling to
rebuild a college,
snda town, from
despalrafter -,
tragedy In uWe
Are,Marshall."
In 1970, West Virginia's Marshall University suffered the
worst air disaster in college sports history when a plane
went down and killed 75 people, including virtually the
entire football team, the coaches and many boosters and
school officials from the town of Huntington, WVa.
In 1971, against all odds -and even
against the misgivings of some towns
people still grieving -Marshall began
the daunting task of playing football
again, Just taking the field seemed like
a victory, and that story is told in "We
Are i'Y'arshall," a drama opening Fri
day that stars Matthew McConaughey
as Jack Lengyel, the new coach who ar
rives in a shattered town, and Matthew
Fox as Red Dawson, a surviving coach
racked with guilt for having given up his seat on the plane before takeoff,
McConaughey, 37, has been a star
since his first major film, 1996's John
Grisham thriller "A Time to Kill," land
ed him on the cover of Vanity Fair af
ter the Texas native spent years doing
small roles in "Dazed and Confused"
(1993), "The Texas Chainsaw Mas
sacre: The Return" (1994) and "Lone
Star" (1996)_ Pennsylvania-born Fox,
40, jumped to fame in 1994 as the oldest
sibling among a family of orphans on TV's "Party of Five," and in 2004, four
years after "Party" was over, he resur
faced on the hit ABC show "Lost"
The two Matthews recently sat
down to jaw with the Daily News about
sports, whether telling a true-life tale
was a burden or a privilege, and to
share their favorite athletic moments .
[To Fox] You've joked that you know
you're growing up when they ask you to
play one of the coaches instead of one of
the players,
FOX: Yeah, it makes you feel a little
old. But I was glad to get back on the
field. It was also kind of a relief. We'd
been shooting the film for a while be
fore we shot the football scenes. We'd
done a lot of the real story. So it was fun
to throw the ball around and have all
the kids out there_ [To McConaughey] And Matthew, you'd
been looking to play some sort of leader or
teacher for a while, right?
McCONAUGHEY: I dIdn't know it was
going to come in the form of an actual
coach, But coUege sports on down, I re
alized you are more of a teacher than
a coach: You have to be more of the la
ther figure, the big brother. If a kid goes
in there who has a great ability and runs
a sloppy route, he needs his face mask
grabbed and have his ass chewed out
A kid goes in there who doesn't have
great ability, who runs as hard as he can
and misses the baU, but he's stiU tryin'
-he's the one who needs an arm put
around him,
[To Fox] Was your greatest athletic
experience breaking the streak at Colum
bia University, where you had been a wide
" ----------i
·-~~-lONE STAR I
McConaughey I
most recently ,
starred In "Sa-:
.: hara" (top, "11th \ I his ex_girlfriend
, Penelope Cruz) \ 1 and "Two for I
I tile Money," ,
: with Al Paclno. t . ,
~---... ---....... ,---'"
receiver In football?
McCONAUGHEY: What'd you do? What
streak did you break?
FOX: I was part of a Columbia team that
was setting the longest losing streak in
NCAA history. When I was recruited , it was
already 20 games deep. We finally -my se·
nior year -ended the losing streak, by win·
mng our homecoming game against Prince·
ton. It was 44 games.
McCONAUGHEY: 44! So you were 0 and 24
leading in? Well, well!
FOX: It was rough. But that's the great
thing about football and any kind of team
sports: You learn so much from that that
you apply in your life. Certainly, I learned
a lot about perseverance and believing in
yourself and working hard and playing un·
der intense adversity. But when we won that
game, the fans came out of the woodwork .
That was a three·day party.
[To McConaughey] And you're a golf fanat·
ic. What's your greatest athletic moment? A
hole In one?
McCONAUGHEY: I've had four hole in i FOUND ON TV
: Fox was the
, eldest sIbling On
"Party of Five"
: (top, wIth Paula
': Devlcq) and now
leads a group of
plane crash SUr.
vlvors (Including
, Evangeline Ully)
: on ulost.ft ,
ones! My first two were II days apart.
Eleven days apart, man! And one I made
in this tournament where whoever made
the hole in one wins a brand· new Subur·
ban. And no one had ever made a hole in
one at the tournament -but I did. And
then I found out: There never reo felt compelled to do it.
McCONAUGHEY: Me, too, [Leans over
conspiratorially] But I didn't tell my
agents! [Laughs] I wanted to make sure
they negotiated all right, but as soon as
ally was a Subllrban! [Laughs 1
People wanted to take 'em to
court. We were like, "You
know what man? Y'all han·
dIe it and get the money to
the Elks Lodge or whatever. "
So it was like a big insurance
scam and there never really
was a truck. they closed I was like, "I"m in." It's sort of
a privilege and an honor to be part
of something that is bigger than
myself. Fox says
that he 'felt
compelled' to
do the film. One thing that was cool for
me -[turns to Fox] I don't
know about you -but we
were portraying real pea·
pIe. and dealing with a trag·
edy that they had in their life.
We could have had that weight
-W·E·I·G·H·T -of responsibili·
ty. But I never felt that; it was almost [To Fox] You've certainly waited a
While to make the leap to movies. Obvious
ly, with TV success on "Party of Five" In the
'90s and now "Lost," you've had all sorts of
opportunIties. What made you finally say yes
to this one?
FOX: Sometimes I'll read scripts that are
really well executed but I just don't feel it
And then with ·We Are Marshall," I just like it was lighter. After we talked to the
townspeople. our minds and hearts were
true and they were embracing that and it
was a privilege more than it was a weight.
FOX: I totally agree. It was the most
amazing experience . And my first one out
of the gate! It's all going to be downhill
from here .• (
"