Powell revealed he’s now juggling his career with studying at the University of Texas. 

He’ll be commuting between Austin for exams and London, where he’s filming Edgar Wright’s adaptation of Stephen King’s The Running Man. 

“Edgar [Wright] has been very nice about letting me finish my degree in the middle of his massive movie,” he recently revealed in an interview with IndieWire, before adding that he won’t be like a regular student sitting in an auditorium day in, day out.

“They’re letting me figure it out [with] distance learning. And I’m obviously going to be coming in, Zooming in for classes and whatnot, but I have to be back for the proctored exams. So, we’re figuring that out for two or three times a semester, I’ll come back for all my stuff.”

It’s not the first time Powell has given higher education a shot: He attended his hometown university as a teenager but dropped out to pursue his dream of making it in Hollywood. 

Over the years, he has taken classes to get the credits he needs to graduate. He had initially planned to graduate this past spring, but then his career exploded.

Upskilling is key to success

Going back to school may seem like a lot of effort for someone who is already on an upward trajectory, to say the least. 

But even Amazon’s CEO Andy Jassy has noted that the single differentiator between those who eventually stagnate and those who continue to enjoy success for years to come is being eager to upskill.

“You have to be ravenous and hungry to find ways to learn,” the 56-year-old Amazon boss said. “The second you think there’s little left for you to learn is the second that you are unwinding as an individual and as a learning professional.” 

“Try to get better, even a little bit better, every single day, every single week that you come into work,” Jassy concluded.

Even 20-time Grand Slam winner Roger Federer has admitted, “I didn’t get where I got on pure talent alone.” 

He may not have gone back to school per se, but he credited his success to constantly never getting complacent and constantly learning new tricks to outwit his opponents: “Most of the time, it’s not about having a gift. It’s about having grit.”

Like Federer, Powell’s pursuit of becoming a UT alumni despite having cemented his status as a Hollywood star is a lesson in perseverance.

“I’m so close, I can taste it,” he previously told the Hollywood Reporter. 

Matthew McConaughey advised him to ditch Hollywood

Powell moved to L.A. at 19 to become an actor. Now that he’s made it, it may seem counterintuitive to leave Hollywood behind at just 35 years old.

But it was megastar and fellow Texan Matthew McConaughey who advised Powell that the ability to switch off is key to sustainable success.

“He’s like, ‘Hollywood is the Matrix, man. You plug in and it’s all fake world,’” Powell told THR, while adding that McConaughey said he goes to “unplug” in Austin where his family and friends are.

Now Powell is adopting a similar ethos, which he thinks makes him better at his job.

“I love this town [Hollywood]. I love this business,” Powell expanded in IndieWire. “Coming here for little chunks of time and doing all the stuff I need to do here, it’s great.”

“I just think that, on a bigger level, you have to listen to your own head and your own heart on how to stay sane and how to stay fresh, creatively fresh,” he added.

“In terms of filling up the pieces of me that need to be refueled between projects and doing stuff like that, that’s all Austin for me.”