The Hollywood best friends have spent years wondering whether they could actually be related, and it turns out they already fight like family

Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson have spent years wondering whether they could actually be brothers.

And judging by McConaughey’s latest revelation, they certainly know how to fight like them.

The Hollywood stars have been close friends for almost three decades, but their relationship hasn’t always been quite as relaxed as it might appear.

McConaughey has now revealed that some of their real-life disagreements have actually turned physical.

And yes, blood has apparently been involved.

The revelation comes as the pair reunite for new Apple TV comedy Brothers, which launches today and takes inspiration from the rather extraordinary possibility that their friendship could have a biological explanation.

Matthew McConaughey says ‘blood has been drawn’ in fights with Woody Harrelson

Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, McConaughey admitted the longtime friends have had physical scraps over the years.

Asked how serious things had become, the Oscar winner revealed that “blood has been drawn.”

Thankfully, we’re not talking about anything quite as dramatic as that sounds.

Harrelson recalled a chipped tooth, while a split lip was also mentioned during the conversation.

McConaughey joked about Harrelson once accidentally catching him in the jaw after overswinging.

Despite occasionally butting heads, neither appears to hold a grudge for very long.

Harrelson explained that they ultimately love each other and tend to make up afterwards.

But the timing of the revelation is particularly amusing.

Because McConaughey and Harrelson are currently promoting a television series based around the possibility that they might genuinely be related.

Are Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson really brothers?

Nobody knows for certain.

It sounds like a Hollywood publicity stunt, but the story behind the rumour actually predates their new series.

The mystery began during a family holiday in Greece several years ago.

Their children were reportedly looking at old photographs and commenting on how similar McConaughey and Harrelson appeared when they were younger.

Then McConaughey’s mother, Kay, dropped a rather significant piece of family history.

She told Harrelson that she had known his father.

And according to McConaughey’s retelling of the story, the way his mother said “knew” suggested she meant considerably more than simply being acquainted with him.

The actors started looking at the dates.

Suddenly, the idea that they could share a father didn’t seem completely impossible.

McConaughey has since explained that his mother and father were going through one of the periods in which they were separated around the relevant time.

Vanity Fair reports that Harrelson believed the theory almost immediately, while McConaughey remained far more sceptical.

Years later, they still haven’t definitively settled it.

Why haven’t Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson taken a DNA test?

There’s an obvious solution to the mystery.

Take a DNA test.

But things become considerably more complicated when the result could change what someone believes about their family.

McConaughey has previously expressed reluctance about genetic testing because discovering Harrelson’s father was also his biological father would inevitably affect how he views his own late dad, James.

Harrelson, meanwhile, appears far more convinced that there could be something to the theory.

The pair recently addressed the DNA question again while promoting their new programme.

McConaughey still isn’t rushing to find out.

That means one of Hollywood’s strangest family mysteries remains exactly that.

A mystery.

Their real-life mystery inspired new Apple TV series Brothers

Rather than settling the question privately, McConaughey and Harrelson have done something considerably more Hollywood with it.

They’ve turned it into a comedy.

Apple TV’s new series Brothers features the pair playing fictionalised versions of themselves.

Their friendship is thrown into chaos after they uncover a decades-old secret suggesting they might actually be brothers.

The premise clearly borrows from their real-life story, although viewers shouldn’t assume everything they see on screen actually happened.

McConaughey has stressed that the series is only loosely based on reality and that their families and circumstances have been fictionalised.

Even the programme acknowledges the uncertainty.

Each episode reportedly opens by describing itself as being based on a “true rumour.”

The eight-episode series premieres on Apple TV today, September 23, with its first two episodes.

A new episode will then arrive every Wednesday through November 4.

Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson go back nearly 30 years

Whether or not they’re related by blood, McConaughey and Harrelson have already spent a substantial part of their lives together.

The actors first became friends after meeting while working on EDTV in the 1990s.

They later appeared together in Surfer, Dude, but their best-known collaboration came in 2014 when they starred as detectives Rust Cohle and Marty Hart in the acclaimed first season of True Detective.

Their families have also become close.

That history is part of what makes the possible sibling connection so strange.

This isn’t simply two actors who happen to resemble one another.

Their families noticed the similarities; McConaughey’s mother provided the unexpected connection to Harrelson’s father, and the timing apparently made the theory plausible enough that they’ve continued discussing it years later.

But without a DNA test, there’s no proof that Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson share a biological father.

For now, they’re best friends rather than confirmed brothers.

Although after almost 30 years of friendship, family holidays, arguments and apparently the occasional chipped tooth, the distinction may not matter all that much.