But when a University of Texas student asked him during a CNN town hall about the future of artificial intelligence replacing actors, there was nothing breezy about his response.

His face grew grave. He stared at the camera. “It’s not coming. It’s here.”

“Don’t deny it,” McConaughey said in a recent conversation alongside actor Timothée Chalamet. “It’s not enough to sit on the sidelines and make the moral plea that this is wrong. That’s not going to last.”

In light of that inevitability, his advice to creators was to “own yourself. Your voice, your likeness, whatever you’ve got—own yourself. So when it comes—not if it comes—no one can steal you.”

The Oscar winner has already acted on that philosophy. As The Wall Street Journal first reported, McConaughey has secured a series of trademarks covering his image and signature expressions—including his famous “alright, alright, alright”—in an effort to create a legal perimeter around his voice and likeness. The goal: make it harder for AI companies or bad actors to simulate him without permission.

“My team and I want to know that when my voice or likeness is ever used, it’s because I approved and signed off on it,” he said in an earlier statement.

For McConaughey, it’s not as simple as just making a quick buck by protecting a catchphrase. He sees the writing on the wall: Tthe movie industry is racing towards automation, with AI-generated replicas of public figures proliferating online. Some celebrities, like TikTok star Khaby Lame, have secured nearly billion dollar deals to protect their likeness.

The film industry is already at a tipping point in which the digital and the physical are becoming indistinguishable. From de-aging legendary stars (such as the Jurassic Park stars in Xfinity’s superbowl ad) to creating entirely synthetic voices that can speak any language with perfect emotion, the technology has moved out of the lab and directly onto the big screen. To try to create some barriers, platforms like YouTube are rolling out likeness-detection tools to help creators combat deepfakes. But legal frameworks remain murky and difficult to parse, especially when AI-generated content isn’t explicitly selling something.

McConaughey says he believes artists can’t rely on moral outrage or future legislation alone.

“When it starts to trespass, you’ll at least have your own agency,” he said. “They’re going to have to come to you and ask, ‘Can I?’Or they’re going to breach, and then you’ll have the chance to say yes for this amount… or no.”

He’s also realistic about how pervasive the technology will become. In five or 10 years, he speculated, awards shows could even feature “Best AI Actor,” believing they could make a separate category for just AI actors.

Chalamet struck a similar but more abstract note, calling it a “dual responsibility” between established stars and younger artists. Those in power today must help keep the door open for human performers, he said, but it will ultimately fall to the younger generation to determine how AI is integrated into creative industries.

“The dreamer in me wants to enable a 19-year-old to produce something they couldn’t otherwise,” Chalamet said. But he also emphasized being “fiercely protective of actors and artisans.”