“Don’t Mess With Texas”
It’s a saying that we’ve all heard a zillion times, but unless you live there, you probably didn’t know that it was part of an anti-littering initiative by Texas Department of Transportation that kicked off in 1985.
It featured celebrity appearances from Willie Nelson, George Strait, Chuck Norris, and a budding young actor named Matthew McConaughey.
According to Josh Bond, the other actor in the commercial, it was initially banned by the state for being to violent.
“This is the commercial I did with Matthew McConaughey in 2000. I’m the guy who gets shot with the blowdart. It got limited airplay because the “powers that be” thought it was too violent so they banned it from TV. It aired before rated R movies for a while in theaters and I believe it finally got some airplay late at night.”
And the rest was history.
