Matthew McConaughey Reveals He Almost Got The Leading Role In ‘Titanic’

If things had just gone Matthew McConaughey’s way, Rose Dewitt Bukater would have been floating across the Atlantic Ocean with a different Jack Dawson in the 1997 blockbuster Titanic, according to reports from E! Online.

During an appearance on the Hollywood Reporter’s “Awards Chatter” podcast, McConaughey revealed his ambition to star across from Kate Winslet in the film as Jack, a role that he eventually lost to Leonardo DiCaprio.

Speaking to the Hollywood Reporter’s Scott Feinberg,”I went and auditioned for that. I wanted that. I auditioned with Kate Winslet.”

While the former star of True Detective felt that he had a successful audition, things didn’t work out for McConaughey. The actor said, “Walked away from there pretty confident that I had it. I didn’t get it. I never got offered that.”

While missing out on a blockbuster that could have launched McConaughey into superstardom at a young age, the actor went on to have a wildly successful career in entertainment, starring in films such as The Wedding Planner, Magic Mike, Interstellar, and White Boy Rick.

Kate Winslet had recently referenced McConaughey’s interview after it was brought up in an interview with Stephen Colbert on The Late Show. Winslet described McConaughey’s audition as “fantastic” while also revealing, “That was the first time I’ve said that in public!”

While she was impressed with McConaughey’s audition, Winslet went on to say, “It would have been a completely different movie. It just wouldn’t have been the whole ‘Jack and Rose, Kate and Leo’ thing.”

Winslet and Colbert went on to discuss the ending of Titanic, in particular, the ending of the film, with Winslet conceding that there was enough room on the door that Rose floated on to make room for Jack.

McConaughey also spoke about his time as the go-to actor for romantic comedies in the mid-to-late 2000s. McConaughey told Feinberg, “It was fun. The pay was great. I was also living on a beach and going out without my shirt on, just like I did before I was famous. I was living a romantic comedy.”

McConaughey went on to explain that his own romance with wife Camila Alves and the birth of his son Levi Alves McConaughey as the trigger to get him off of the romantic comedy throne and try some more difficult roles, saying, “My life was becoming very vital and exciting and dreams were coming true and things were new and scary. Then I looked at my career and I was like, ‘Eh, doesn’t seem as exciting, doesn’t seem as fresh, doesn’t seem as dangerous. I feel like I’m loving harder and laughing harder and crying harder in real life than I’m getting to do in my work.”

It turned out to be a good decision for McConaughey, who went on to win the Best Performance by an Actor Oscar in 2014 for his role in Dallas Buyers Club.