Matthew Perry, Friends Star, Dead at 54
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Matthew Perry, best known for playing Chandler Bing on NBC’s Friends, has died. He was 54.
According to TMZ, Perry was discovered unresponsive in the jacuzzi at his Los Angeles-area home Saturday afternoon by his assistant. The site initially reported that his cause of death was drowning, but that has not been confirmed.
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*Update*: The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner’s office has updated its case online Sunday evening, stating that Perry’s cause of death had been “deferred.” This usually means that an autopsy has been performed, but the examiner needs additional time to investigate. In addition, a spokesperson told People Sunday that the results are pending a toxicology report, which could take several weeks to complete.
Perry’s role as Chandler on Friends, which ran from 1994 to 2004, made him and costars Jennifer Aniston, Matt LeBlanc, Lisa Kudrow, David Schwimmer and Courteney Cox household names. He was nominated for an Emmy in 2002 for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series. He was nominated four other times, including twice for his guest work on The West Wing.
Additional TV credits include NBC’s Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, CBS’ Odd Couple reboot and the short-lived sitcoms Mr. Sunshine (on ABC) and Go On (on NBC).
On the big screen, he starred in the films Fools Rush In, Almost Heroes, The Whole Nine Yards, 17 Again and The Ron Clark Story.
Matthew Perry’s Biggest TV Roles
Perry was open about his struggles with drugs and alcohol. In his 2022 memoir, Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing, he revealed that he started drinking when he was 14.
By age 18, he was drinking every day, and he hoped his breakout Friends role might serve as a cure for his addiction. But the pressures of being on a massive hit only drove him deeper into drinking.
“Acting was another one of my drugs,” he wrote. “And it didn’t do the damage that alcohol was already starting to do. In fact, it was getting harder and harder to wake up after a night of drinking.”
In the book, he detailed the “Vicodin habit” that endured throughout much of Friends, writing, “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.”
Perry told Diane Sawyer in an ABC special last year that he didn’t indulge while on the Friends set: “I made a rule that I would never drink or take anything at work… but I would show up blindly hungover. Like, shaking and crazy hungover.”
Perry said Aniston confronted him about his drinking, telling him they could smell the alcohol on him. In fact, throughout his struggles, Aniston always checked in on him, Perry revealed. “She was the one that reached out the most,” he told Sawyer. “I’m really grateful for that.”
Perry also recounted in his memoir a near-death experience he suffered in 2018 when he was hospitalized for five months after his colon burst due to his abuse of OxyContin. “The doctors told my family that I had a two-percent chance to live,” he told People. “That’s the time I really came close to my life ending.”
When the L.A. Times asked him last April how he would like to be remembered, Perry responded, “As a guy who lived life, loved well, lived well, and helped people. That running into me was a good thing, and not something bad.”
Warner Bros. Television, the studio behind Friends, issued the following statement late Saturday: “We are devastated by the passing of our dear friend Matthew Perry. Matthew was an incredibly gifted actor and an indelible part of the Warner Bros. Television Group family. The impact of his comedic genius was felt around the world, and his legacy will live on in the hearts of so many. This is a heartbreaking day, and we send our love to his family, his loved ones, and all of his devoted fans.”
NBC, meanwhile, released its own statement, saying, “We are incredibly saddened by the too soon passing of Matthew Perry. He brought so much joy to hundreds of millions of people around the world with his pitch perfect comedic timing and wry wit. His legacy will live on through countless generations.”
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