"For things that were happening in character and out of character and off set, we had gotten under each other's skin a little bit."
It's been 20 years since Kate Hudson left Matthew McConaughey speechless thanks to one perfect yellow dress in "How to Lose a Guy In 10 Days" -- and the two former costars just reunited to celebrate the milestone anniversary.
While they weren't able to meet up in person, Hudson hosted an Instagram Live with McConaughey on her page Monday, ahead of the romcom's actual anniversary tomorrow. "Can you believe it's been 20 years?" Hudson asked, before they both agreed that, yes, it does feel like it's been that long -- since "a lot of life has happened," she noted.
The pair then reconnected over how it feels to be in their 40s and 50s, before catching each other up on their family lives now. Matthew even surprised his former costar by saying he recently ran into her parents, Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell, in Greece -- where they had a few laughs at Hudson's "expense."
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Shifting focus back to the film, Hudson said it's been "amazing" to see how it has found new life with a younger generation, pointing to viral TikTok challenges using audio from the movie. "All of these things from our movie and all these younger kids are re-doing it," she said, as McConaughey said he too has noticed an influx of newcomers commenting about the movie to him.
Hudson then asked some question submitted by fans, saying that the most popular ones she got were for them to name their favorite moments from filming and what it was like to kiss one another.
"My whole thing is, we're always in a weird environment. There's only one time where we kissed that it was so nice and gentle in the bathroom," noted Kate, as Matthew joked, "Everything else has not been climate controlled. Exhaust is blowing in from 18 wheelers."
"I always say to people when you're kissing anyone in a movie, it's professional. In respects to our now partners, we do kiss nicely," Kate added, with which Matthew agreed.
McConaughey then said his favorite scene to film was the one in which Kathryn Hahn pretends to be a therapist, before they both praised director Donald Petrie for giving them the freedom to really riff together on set. While they noted the "bones were always there" in the script, Kate said "a lot of the stuff we came up with is what's in the movie today."
They then reflected on shooting the movie's poster (above left), which McConaughey said was widely copied and became the standard for romcoms for a bit. The image shows the two back to back, while Hudson wears the infamous yellow dress -- a dress she wasn't sure she even wore the day of the photoshoot.
"Let's give props to that yellow dress ... the yellow dress was the bomb," said McConaughey. "That yellow dress has lived on," added Hudson, "I feel really lucky because I've had a couple moments in movies that have had a real iconic look."
The pair also talked about the scene from the near the end of the movie where their characters air out all their grievances with one another while singing "You're So Vain" during a fancy ball. She remembered it being somewhat "kind of hard" to film and a "long day."
"Underneath, I know exactly what you're talking about, probably for things that were happening in character and out of character and off set, we had gotten under each other's skin a little bit," recalled McConaughey.
"Where we were legitimately kind of pissed off at each other in a really cool way. There's that line, remember, this ends up with charm, this ends up coming together," he continued. "I remember having a few scenes like, 'Okay, that worked but can we inject a little more of the charm and the love and the desire and the lust in there?'"
"I think by that time, we had added up all the ways we had wronged each other," he added, as Hudson laughed. "We made it work," she said, before they both praised the other for how they were able to work together at the time.
"I'll say this ... we were kind of two heavyweights going at it and both rock and roll ... what tickles me doesn't bruise you. What tickles you doesn't bruise me," said McConaughey. "We enjoyed going toe-to-toe like that, it was fair game for whatever you wanted to pull out on the other and we knew it wasn't personal. If it was personal, even better and hopefully the camera's rolling. We just said it's all fair game, let's keep our sense of humor but let's go hard on each other."
"We don't take things personally and we're tough skinned," added Kate, "I feel like we're both very free."
The two wrapped up the chat by sharing where they think their characters are today.
"I have a version, it's like there's the real version that I want for Andie and Ben and the movie version," explained Hudson. "The real version, I hope they're still happy, have kids and made it work. But in the movie version, what's the conflict? I don't know what that is. But there's definitely conflict in the movie version."
McConaughey had no suggestions -- but assured fans the love fern would still be alive and kicking.