Celebrating McConaughey's Nude Bongo Bust

OCTOBER 25--Twenty years ago today, Texas cops responding to a 2:30 AM noise complaint discovered an intoxicated and naked Matthew McConaughey “dancing and playing bongo drums” while music blared and pot smoke hung in the air at his rented Austin residence.

McConaughey, a week shy of his 30th birthday, was partying with fellow “Dazed and Confused” actor Cole Hauser when police arrived at the modest Meadowbrook Drive residence, according to an arrest affidavit.

Upon approaching an open side door, an officer reported that, “I could see a nude, white male dancing and playing bongo drums.” The music was so loud, the cop added, he “knew they would not hear me if I knocked or hollered.” So the patrolman settled on aiming his flahlight into the home in an attempt to catch the attention of Hauser and McConaughey, a Texas native who attended the University of Texas at Austin.

When that approach failed, cops entered the residence and were quickly spotted by McConaughey, who turned off the radio and began yelling, “You can’t be in here! Get the fuck out of the house! Why are you here?” Hauser chimed in with similar sentiments.

The Austin cops, who explained that they were responding to a noise complaint, reported that McConaughey and Hauser were “very intoxicated,” smelled of booze, and “swayed while standing still.”

When an officer asked McConaughey, the “nude subject,” for ID, the performer replied, “You’re violating our rights! You can’t come in my house like this!” The home was dimly lit with “low lights and candles” and contained a bong, a bowl with pot, and a “one-hitter” pipe.

“I asked the nude male several times to put some pants on,” a cop reported. “He responded by saying ‘Fuck you.’”

When a patrolman subsequently sought to handcuff McConaughey, the actor “reached out with his left hand as if to push me while saying, ‘Fuck you.’” After being cuffed, McConaughey continued to ignore police orders, prompting one cop to try and force compliance by “pushing on a pressure point above his collar bone.”

When McConaughey, who was still naked, asked why he was being arrested, an officer said he faced a possession of drug paraphernalia charge. Before walking McConaughey out to a squad car, the cop wrapped “a long sleeve shirt around his waist to cover him.”

“This is bullshit,” McConaughey yelled as he struggled with the officer leading him to the patrol vehicle. When a cop asked McConaughey to sit in the car, he refused, saying “Fuck you!” McConaughey was stuffed into the police car, but not before a cop had to “take him by the hair” and then kneed him “in the hip area to bend his body backwards into the seat.”

The criminal case against McConaughey was eventually reduced to a noise ordinance violation for which the star paid a small fine.

McConaughey today lives on an Austin estate with his wife and the couple’s three children. Their nine-acre Hillbilly Lane property is about 10 miles from the 1929-square-foot home where McConaughey’s nude bongo performace occurred. Oddly, the latter property (seen below) has yet to be listed in the National Register of Historic Places. (3 pages)