Matthew Mcconaughey has been snapped looking dangerously skinny.

The 43 year-old actor was pictured by US Magazine at Los Angeles International Airport, to catch a flight to New Orleans. The Magic Mike star looks unhealthily gaunt – almost unrecognisable, in jeans, a long-sleeved shirt and sporting a handlebar moustache and his weight loss is fast becoming a hot topic online.

Fans of the actor needn’t get too worried though; he’s been losing weight for his new film role, in The Dallas Buyer’s Club, which he’s in the middle of filming right now. McConaughey plays the role of Ron Woodroof, a drug addict in 1980s Texas, who contracts HIV. Woodroof went on to become one of the first ever AIDS activists and launched one of the first ever support groups for AIDS sufferers. He stars alongside Jennifer Garner and Jared Leto in the movie, which is scheduled for release in 2013. Earlier this year, he told US Magazine how he managed to drop the weight for the role, after buffing up to play a stripper in Magic Mike. Back in August, he was eating “small amounts” of high protein, low carbohydrate food and seemed pretty determined to get down to the weight that was required of him “I'll get down to the weight I need to get to," he told the magazine. "I'm on my way, and it's what I need to do for the job… “I'm playing a guy who was sick and would have loved to have been healthier but wasn't," he explained. "For me, it's more of a mental thing than a physical thing."

McConaughey isn’t the only Hollywood actor that’s had to go gaunt for a film role, though. Remember Christian Bale in The Machinist? The Batman actor dropped down to a scary weight for his role as an insomniac machinist.