Hollywood actor Matthew McConaughey has turned one of the wildest moments of his past into a light-hearted celebration. The Oscar winner recently revisited his infamous 1999 arrest for playing bongo drums naked in his Texas home, this time in a humorous ad for Pantalones Organic Tequila — a brand he co-founded with his wife, Camila Alves.
In the short film, the 55-year-old actor relives the October 25, 1999, incident, when police stormed his Austin residence in the early hours and found him “dancing and playing bongo drums” while smoking marijuana. The ad opens with a tongue-in-cheek narration by Law and Order voice actor Steve ZirnKilton: “What follows is a real police report; no names have been changed because he was totally guilty.”
McConaughey and Camila then give a dramatic reading of the police report. As Camila reads the details, her husband provides a live bongo beat, jokingly adding flair to each line. When she reads, “The nude subject yelled, ‘Why are you here? You can’t be in here,’” McConaughey repeats her words in rhythm, eyes closed and grinning.
At one point, she reads the line, “The subject’s eyes were glassy and bloodshot,” prompting McConaughey to cheekily respond, “And?”
Speaking to People, McConaughey said, “If playing the bongos in my birthday suit gives us an anniversary worth raising a glass to, I’ll pour some Pantalones and cheers to it.” Camila playfully added, “Only Matthew could turn a night like that into something we celebrate with tequila.”
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The couple — married since 2012 and parents to three children, Levi, Vida, and Livingston — laugh and toast to the memory. Camila jokes that she can vividly picture the event, to which McConaughey quips, “Because it’s happened about 45 times since.”
To mark the occasion, the brand introduced a new cocktail dubbed Pantsless & Famous, a twist on the Naked & Famous, featuring Aperol, yellow chartreuse, and fresh lime juice.
The Dallas Buyers Club star has often reflected on the night. In his 2020 memoir Greenlights, McConaughey wrote that the police entered his home without warning while he was “banging away in bliss.” He recalled being wrestled to the ground and handcuffed, later joking that when told he’d be charged with resisting arrest, he replied, “You broke in my house! F— yeah, I resisted.”
He has also fondly shared his mother’s reaction to the ordeal. “She told me, ‘You hold your head high. I know what you were doing last night, and you’ll probably do it again,’” McConaughey said during an appearance at the Texas Book Festival last year.
More than two decades later, the once-controversial incident has become a humorous symbol of McConaughey’s free-spirited nature — one he now celebrates, tequila glass in hand.
