Beloved television actor Jason Ritter, son of the late, great John Ritter, is currently starring in CBS’s reboot of Matlock, the long-running 1980s-1990s legal procedural that once starred Andy Griffith. This version features renowned actress Kathy Bates in the title role, with Ritter as Julian Markston, a senior partner at the law firm where Bates’s Madeline “Matty” Matlock begins working. As of last year, though, Ritter has also been starring on his own social media accounts as an interpretive dancer. With the original Matlock theme song as his muse, Ritter has been posting videos of himself in various modes of freestyle and interpretive dance, much to the delight of followers.
His most recent video has 1.2M views on TikTok and 29K likes on Instagram. Fans from across the internet are delighting in the actor’s joy and freedom of movement. Among them, is the Matlock series Instagram itself, which wrote, “These dances are one of the highlights of new episode week!”
Typically Ritter will first share excitement for the week’s show in the caption, then follow it with a few words about what he’s doing in the video, always with a chuckle of self-awareness. For example, “Today’s dance includes a dash of Riverdance, (although I could not for the life of me keep my arms still or by my side) and just a bit of breakdancing on the nose. We have a touch of ballet somewhere in there, but today’s dance has been mostly freestyle topped with a sprinkle of harmless anger to make the moves a bit faster,” he writes.
Ritter, who has no shortage of comedic talents of his own, has been experimenting with physical comedy on social media for several years, which are also apparent in his consistent Matlock theme song interpretive dances. He’s just not afraid to let loose and be weird, no matter what anyone else thinks. Because, as he shared, he’d just spent too much time in his life wondering about it already.
“My little 8th grade brain said ‘oh thank heavens I can stop trying to be something I am just not, which is whatever ‘cool’ is. And after that any time I felt worried about doing something, like dancing or anything I would ask myself if what I was afraid of was just being embarrassed,” he wrote on TikTok. “And if it was just that, I’d force myself to go out on a limb and do it! And a lot of times I had to sit in the embarrassment, but I at least learned something from it!!”
“So anyway I enjoy being a bit of a fool!,” he continued. “So now I dance like no one’s watching and then I post it for anyone to see because that is BY FAR the most potentially embarrassing option and I am here to embarrass myself as much as possible.”
From Ritter, we can learn the beauty of being silly, of not taking ourselves too seriously, of letting ourselves experience not just movement but joy with reckless abandon. It’s time to cue up that Matlock theme song yourself and get your groove on.
