Matthew McConaughey’s wife, Camila Alves, gave a rare glimpse into her “difficult” relationship with her mother-in-law, Mary Kathlene “Kay” McCabe.
The 41-year-old Brazilian model opened up about the difficult beginnings with Kay, who the family dubbed ‘Ma Mac’, in a new episode of Southern Living’s Biscuits & Jam podcast.
Alves, who shares three children with the 53-year-old Oscar winner, to whom she has been married since 2012, revealed Kay, now 91, started “testing” her after she first started dating him in 2006.
“She did all those things when I first got in the picture, didn’t she?” She really tested me. I mean, it’s really testing me.’
“She called me by all of Matthew’s ex-girlfriends’ names and started speaking Spanish to me in a very broken way.” [me] something down. I mean all sorts of things.’
‘Tricky’: Matthew McConaughey’s wife Camila Alves, 41, shared a rare glimpse into her ‘tricky’ relationship with her mother-in-law Mary Kathlene “Kay” McCabe, 91; Camila seen in 2023
Difficult beginnings: “She was doing all these things the first time I was in the picture.” She really tested me. “I mean, it’s really testing me,” Camilla revealed Tuesday; The trio in 2014
Camila then described the incident that led Kay to eventually accept her as part of the family.
She recalled telling her mother-in-law after getting a modeling job in Istanbul and receiving an extra first-class ticket and free hotel stay, “Ma Mac, you’re coming with me.”
“All the way there, the entire flight to Istanbul, she told me all these stories and put all these things in my head,” Camila continued.
“When we landed, I said, ‘Okay, all right. let me buckle up Let me be prepared for this situation.”’
“About day three, I took her to her room, and she got into this whole different thing that I wasn’t allowed to share, and she started crying, and I was like, ‘Oh my God!’ You know, “Ma Mac!” and I’m so sorry. And when I put her to bed, I look at her and I’m like, ‘Oh my God. She’s full of shit.”
That’s when Camila decided it was time to stand up for herself.
“Well, just me [flipped] it on her and brought my spicy Brazilian Latino side and I let her have it. So I went back to her and we talked back and forth, back and forth.’
In the end, the interaction earned her Ma Mac’s respect.
MIL: “She would definitely call me.” [his] When I gave my ex-girlfriends’ names, she started speaking Spanish to me in a very broken way, so to speak [me] “down a bit,” she shared; Pictured in 2014
All good: Camila said her relationship with Kay took a turn after she finally admitted to herself one day: “She just looked at me and said, ‘Okay. Now you’re in’”; Pictured 2019
Closer than ever: In 2020, the two discussed their close bond on The Drew Barrymore Show and how it “took some work” to get to where they are today
“She just looked at me and said, ‘Okay. Now you’re in,” Camila explained, adding, “All she wanted was for me to fight back.”
She revealed that the duo have had a great relationship since that day, although it can get “difficult” at times.
“From this day, from this night we have the most amazing relationship and I have so much respect for her.”
“She has so much respect for me,” she shared, adding, “Sometimes it can get difficult.” However, Camilla explained, “We always end with a good laugh and a joke.”
And in 2020, on The Drew Barrymore Show, the two discussed their close bond and how it “took some work” to get to where they are today.
Kay said the two strong-willed women “put each other to the test” when Camila and Matthew started courting, but the model saw things a little differently: “Well, I’ll say more, you put me to the test.” , she said.
Camilla isn’t the only one in the family who has had a hard time getting along with Ma Mac at one point.
Matthew himself famously didn’t speak to his mother for eight years after she kept leaking their private conversations to the press, eventually leading him to put “some boundaries” on her.
“I was having conversations and suddenly – whoops – what we were talking about ended up in the paper three days later,” the Dallas Buyers Club star shared on The Howard Stern Show in 2020.
Happy family: Alves started dating McConaughey in 2006 and they married in 2012. The couple have three children together: Levi (15), Vida (13) and Livingston (10); Seen in 2019
Candid: In 2020, Matthew and his mother Kay met for their first interview together, following the release of his new memoir, which details their eight-year estrangement
After constantly telling her that their conversations needed to be one-to-one, his turning point came when she gave a tour of his childhood home on television.
When Stern asked if he stopped talking to his mother after she showed him the bed where he “lost his virginity,” he replied that those years had been “tough.”
Over the years, Matthew has “forgiven” her and she even quarantined with him, Camila and their children Levi, 15, Vida, 13, and Livingston, 10, during lockdowns due to the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 .
“It’s been tough for eight years, but we’ve been through it and we’re on the other side.” “It’s good,” he shared, noting that things between them weren’t “tough” anymore.