Matthew Perry.Photo: Taylor Hill/Getty
Matthew Perryopened up last year about the heartbreaking reason he did not watchFriends.
“And I don’t think anybody else can, but I certainly could. And that’s why I don’t want to watch it because that’s what I see, that’s what I noticed when I watch it.”
“You can track the trajectory of my addiction if you gauge my weight from season to season — when I’m carrying weight, it’s alcohol; when I’m skinny, it’s pills. When I have a goatee, it’s lots of pills. By the end of season three, I was spending most of my time figuring out how to get 55 Vicodin a day — I had to have 55 every day, otherwise I’d get so sick,” Perry wrote.
He then wrote that in the final episode of season 3 of the show, the white shirt and tan slacks he wore “both look at least three sizes too big for me.”
Perry went on to ask the reader to compare this to “how I look between the final episode of season 6 and the first of season 7 — the Chandler-Monica proposal episodes. I’m wearing the same clothes in the final episode of six and the first of seven [it’s supposed to be the same night], but I must have lost fifty pounds in the off-season,” he wrote. “My weight varied between 128 pounds and 225 pounds during the years ofFriends.”
Perry played Chandler Bing on ‘Friends’ from 1994 to 2004.NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty
NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty
Despite being reminded of his difficult personal journey, Perry in the interview with Tom Power that he was considering watching the show again, because of the “incredible” experience of filming the hit ‘90s sitcom, which he starred in alongsideJennifer Aniston,Courteney Cox,David Schwimmer,Matt LeBlancandLisa Kudrow.
“But I think I’m going to start to watch it because, first of all, it was an incredible ride,” Perry continued. “But it’s been an incredible thing to watch it touch the hearts of different generations. It’s become this important, significant thing and I, you know, I would watch that again. It was really funny and all the people were nice. And I’ve been too worried about this.”
Perry was found dead at a Los Angeles-area home on Saturday.TMZreported that the actor was found in a jacuzzi at the residence and, per their sources, first-responders were called to the residence for cardiac arrest. No drugs were found at the scene and no foul play was reported, per the outlet.
Before his death, Perryopened up to PEOPLEabout his years-long battle with drug and alcohol addiction ahead of the release of his 2022 memoir,Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing, in which he also detailed his addiction battle.
Newsmakers/Getty
TheFriendsstar shared that he first became addicted to opioids after an accident in 1997.“I hadn’t had a pill before that,” Perry told PEOPLE last October. “That first high from it was euphoria. And then I didn’t need to drink, which made you sweat and made you smell of alcohol. Ultimately that’s how my friends knew that I was doing something else, because I stopped drinking.”
The actor explained that his addictions had begun to surface when he won the part of Chandler in famed show at the age of 24.
“I didn’t know how to stop,” he said. “The disease and the addiction is progressive, so it gets worse and worse as you grow older.”
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Perry died aged 54 on Saturday.Gregg DeGuire/FilmMagic
Gregg DeGuire/FilmMagic
Perry also told PEOPLE in October that hisFriendsco-stars had rallied around him as he struggled with addiction while filming the show. “They were understanding, and they were patient,” he said. “It could be said that [doing the show] saved me.”
As he discussed who he was at the beginning ofFriends, the actor described himself as “desperate” to be a star and talked about how it had taken him around a decade to re-evaluate his approach.
“He was just a guy desperate for fame, thinking that it would fix everything. Just “on” all the time,” he said, adding, “It wasn’t until my mid-30s that I realized I don’t have to do that because it’s probably annoying to people. I was 24 when I got [the role], and the disease was just getting started right around then.“Perry, who famously earned $1 million a week onFriends, elsewhere said that he would trade his fame and fortune “to not have this disease.”
“But I don’t belittle how fun the experience has been onFriends. And the money was amazing. Just the creative experience of being on the show probably saved my life,” Perry said. “When you’re making a million dollars a week, you can’t drink the 37th drink. You have to go home and go to sleep.”
If you or someone you know is struggling with substance abuse, please contact the SAMHSA helpline at 1-800-662-HELP.
source: people.com
