{"id":270931,"date":"2026-01-29T23:24:14","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T23:24:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/270931\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T23:24:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T23:24:14","slug":"what-matty-matheson-watches-and-plays-with-his-kids","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/270931\/","title":{"rendered":"What Matty Matheson Watches (and Plays) With His Kids"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\n Photo-Illustration: Vulture; Photos: Getty Images, Everett Collection, Netflix, Amazon\n <\/p>\n

If Matty Matheson were a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, he\u2019d be Michelangelo.<\/p>\n

At least, that\u2019s what the chef, actor, and restaurateur wanted to be as a kid. \u201cI think my personality definitely leaned Michelangelo,\u201d Matheson says. \u201cI still think TMNT is one of the greatest movies ever, too. I have two brothers and a sister, and the deal was that we had to be good in church for like a month to be able to go to the theater to see that movie. The last weekend, when we were supposed to go to the movies right after church, one of us got in trouble and we all just started crying because we were so upset. Luckily, my parents still took us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now a father of three, Matheson leans into the joy (and pain) of parenting, encouraging his kids to embrace what it means to be truly bored. It\u2019s something he\u2019s keenly aware of himself, raw-dogging flights with no entertainment when he travels to work on shows like The Bear<\/a> and his kooky cooking program, Just a Dash, now streaming on Netflix.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is no diss against whatever anyone else is doing, but my kids aren\u2019t allowed to bring iPads in the car and they\u2019re not allowed to bring anything into restaurants,\u201d he says. \u201cThey can act like children and they can deal with boredom. That\u2019s life. They can drop their fork as many times as they want and act like they need to use the washroom every five minutes, but you have to allow them to be bored. They have to have that time to use their imaginations, to sit there and wonder.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what Matheson and his kids watch, listen to, and play, both on screens and off.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Photo: Disney+\n <\/p>\n

For a while, I tried to get my kids into things I liked and then really quickly realized that they weren\u2019t into a lot of it.<\/p>\n

My youngest daughter is 5 and kind of a monster. She\u2019s into Bluey. I don\u2019t have a favorite episode, though. Gun to my head right now, I could not pick one.<\/p>\n

My middle daughter, Rizzo, is 7, so she\u2019s starting to watch \u2014 I don\u2019t even know what the hell it is, but it\u2019s like teenage sitcom stuff, like Hannah Montana but not. She\u2019s a girlie-girl. She likes her purse and Taylor Swift. All of that.<\/p>\n

\"HALLOWEEN\" <\/p>\n

Photo: Everett Collection\n <\/p>\n

My son, Mac, loves Michael Myers. We lasted a long time not showing him some horror movies, but he is so dedicated to the craft of them that we gave in.<\/p>\n

I grew up in a house where I didn\u2019t see an R-rated movie until I was 15. But now, as long as there\u2019s no S-E-X stuff, we\u2019ll let him watch it. Like, he doesn\u2019t watch Nightmare on Elm Street, but we let him watch Halloween.<\/p>\n

He really just loves horror movies. He writes horror screenplays, too, which is so cute.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Photo: Netflix\/Courtesy Everett Collection\n <\/p>\n

My son also likes Stranger Things.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t remember if it was that show, but he was watching something and they wrote \u201cslut\u201d on someone\u2019s locker, and all my kids then wanted to know what that meant. My wife and I were like, \u201cIt\u2019s not even a bad thing. It\u2019s just someone who loves kissing people and having fun. We don\u2019t think it\u2019s a problem.\u201d<\/p>\n

A lot of language in \u201980s movies hasn\u2019t aged well, either. We were watching The Monster Squad and they said the F-slur a couple of times, and it was just like, \u201cDude, we can\u2019t watch this.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Led <\/p>\n

Photo: Laurance Ratner\/WireImage\n <\/p>\n

On Sundays, we usually go to this diner called the Breakfast Beacon<\/a>. We\u2019ll pile into my old \u201970s GMC truck and we just have a crappy little Bluetooth speaker in there. I\u2019ll always play soul music or some good country music. They love Led Zeppelin the most. They also love Black Sabbath\u2019s \u201cIron Man.\u201d<\/p>\n

Growing up, my dad was into the blues, but he was also more into AC\/DC, Zeppelin, and Black Sabbath way more than he was into, say, the Beatles. He was a \u201970s muscle-car guy who just wanted to listen to Foghat and, like, what was essentially the Dazed and Confused soundtrack. We always had a clapped-out Camaro or something like that as our family car, and that\u2019s what we\u2019d listen to when we\u2019d drive from Fort Erie \u2014 which is in Ontario \u2014 to the Maritimes, which is like a 14-hour drive. We\u2019d put a pillow in the middle of the back because there weren\u2019t even three seats and us three boys would have to sit in the back, switching who sat on the pillow every 100 miles or so.<\/p>\n

Man, a lot has changed since then. At the very least, I don\u2019t think most parents are driving cross-country without seatbelts on their kids anymore.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Photo: DreamWorks\n <\/p>\n

Maybe one of my proudest moments as a father so far was when my kids got to come to the Gabby\u2019s Dollhouse movie premiere with me. We all got to go to L.A. and it was their first time in California, and they got to meet Gabby.<\/p>\n

It was really cool to be a part of that and to be Cookie Bobby. They make this giant stuffed Cookie Bobby<\/a> and they sent us some, and both my daughters sleep with it every night. It\u2019s so cute. I\u2019m truly proud to be a part of that project.<\/p>\n

\"Still <\/p>\n

Photo: Norman Posselt\/Getty Images\n <\/p>\n

I taught my kids a dice game called Threes<\/a>, which they love. It\u2019s fun because you get to roll a fair amount and it\u2019s a math game, sort of. We don\u2019t gamble on it as a family, but me and Mac have played a couple of games for a few bucks, which was fun.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Photo: Capcom\n <\/p>\n

I got my kids Nintendo Switches because I thought they\u2019d like them, but my daughters aren\u2019t really old enough to comprehend it yet, I don\u2019t think. They haven\u2019t gravitated toward the Switch.<\/p>\n

My son plays Minecraft and Roblox, but we don\u2019t let him play online. My middle daughter would rather play stupid, nothing games on the iPad. There\u2019s one where you have to make eggs? It\u2019s not even a game. It\u2019s literally nothingness.<\/p>\n

I did get them one of these mini Street Fighter arcade games<\/a>, though, and they really like that. That made me really stoked, because they\u2019re just using this tiny arcade machine and they\u2019re playing against each other. It\u2019s fun.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Photo: Amazon\n <\/p>\n

My kids unfortunately don\u2019t really care about the long legacy of excellent Canadian kids\u2019 TV.<\/p>\n

I always loved Mr. Dressup, which was like our version of Mister Rogers but definitely more Canadian.<\/p>\n

I think it\u2019s amazing that in Canada, there\u2019s money put aside to let people build and dream and make things like that show. The show I\u2019m working on now, Just a Dash [streaming now on Netflix], has been lucky enough to get grants from Canadian government arts programs, which feels great. I feel like a lot of major networks wouldn\u2019t make the kind of stuff that grants help make, but some of those programs end up becoming the most beloved, earnest, good shows.<\/p>\n


\n See All<\/p>\n

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