Matthew Perry was once one of television’s most beloved actors. For ten years, from 1994 to 2004, he played the unforgettable and sarcastic Chandler Bing on Friends, but while his pockets were lined with lots of cash, his private life was falling apart. From an addiction to Vicodin and alcohol abuse to several trips to rehab, Perry’s Hollywood life hasn’t been all red carpets and applause.
A jet ski accident started his alcoholism
Perry’s initial spiral out of control had nothing to do with hard-partying in Hollywood. According to People, the star suffered a jet ski accident 1997 and became addicted to prescribed Vicodin.
“’Here, take this,’” he remembers the doctors telling him. “I did and I felt better than I ever felt in my entire life. I had a big problem with pills and alcohol, and I couldn’t stop.”
Things were further complicated by the success of Friends. “I was on Friends from age 24 to 34,” Perry said. “I was in the white-hot flame of fame. The six of us were just everywhere all the time. From an outsider’s perspective, it would seem like I had it all. It was actually a very lonely time for me because I was suffering from alcoholism. It was going on before Friends, but it’s a progressive disease. I wasn’t a massive party guy. I wasn’t a bull-in-a-china-shop kind of drinker.”
He went to rehab multiple times
In 1997, Perry made his first trip to rehab to try to kick his pill habit. According to People, he stayed 28 days at Minnesota’s Hazelden Foundation rehabilitation center. The following year he told,”I don’t think there’s anything in the world that I can’t face, having faced that,” he said. “That was the scariest thing that’s ever happened to me. You get a whole new respect for yourself and life when you go through something that difficult.”
He suffered from pancreatitis
In between his first and second trips to rehab, Perry wound up in the hospital for two weeks with acute pancreatitis and lost 20 pounds. The condition is reportedly caused by both alcohol abuse and prescription drug abuse.
“In my case, it was hard living and drinking hard and eating poorly,” he said. “You play, you pay. But there were no pills involved. I learned my lesson at Hazelden.”
Following his release from the hospital, Perry crashed his Porsche into an empty house. He was uninjured in the snafu, and neither drugs nor alcohol were found in his system at the time. “The irony was terrible,” it was an awful day. “I was going to hang with my father at his place outside L.A. I made the first corner around my house on these really narrow streets, saw a courier van in the middle, swerved to the right and—well, I don’t really know what happened—I crashed into this porch.”
He made a third trip to rehab
Perry returned to rehab for a third time in 2011. He had not relapsed but was simply being proactive. “I’m making plans to go away for a month to focus on my sobriety and to continue my life in recovery,” he said. “Please enjoy making fun of me on the world wide web.”
From there, Perry began striving to advocate for others recovering from drug and alcohol abuse. Speaking with lawmakers, the actor said, “Drug courts are the single most effective program for curing serious drug addicts for lifelong recovery.” Perry added, “Any opportunity I get to talk about drug courts on a one-on-one level or a much bigger level—like testifying in that scary room—I grab at because it’s just one of the few things that’s a no-brainer: it saves lives, it saves money, it’s bipartisan.”
He forgot three years of Friends
Three years of Friends are a little blurry for Perry. As he revealed in a BBC interview, he can’t remember a big chunk of the series because of his addiction. When asked what his least favorite episode was, Perry didn’t mince words. “Oh, my goodness,” he said. “I think the answer is, I don’t remember three years of it. So none of those… somewhere between season 3 and 6.”
Perry told People in 2013 that his struggles were hard to mask. “I couldn’t stop. Eventually things got so bad that I couldn’t hide it, and then everybody knew.” He said he never used drugs or abused alcohol while on set. “I was never high at work,” he said. “I was painfully hungover.”
He turned his house into a rehab facility
Perry’s work to help others fighting their demons went beyond speaking with lawmakers. He took it a step further and opened his former home to those in need in 2013.
Perry created Perry’s House for men seeking a 12-step sobriety and meditation program. He essentially gave up his four bedroom Malibu home to help others.
He partnered with interventionist and addiction specialist Earl Hightower to prepare. “Matthew is an ambassador of possibility for a vast group of people,” Hightower said. “People he’ll never meet will get services because he championed their cause.”
He was recognized by the White House
In May 2013, Perry was awarded the Champion of Recovery Award from the Obama Administration’s Office of National Drug Control Policy. Perry was speechless.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, he called the honor “surreal,” adding, “During my darkest times, I never could of imagined receiving an award at the White House.”
In 2015, Perry was given the Phoenix Rising Award by the famed rehab facility Phoenix House. “You can’t have a drug problem for 30 years and then expect to have it be solved in 28 days,” Perry told The Hollywood Reporter about his award.
“At Phoenix House, I was very moved by the hope that I saw there, which is what this is all about. Getting sober is a really hard thing to do.”
Ever the comedian, he quipped, “I’m an award-winning alcoholic. I shouldn’t be getting an award; Phoenix House should be getting an award.”
He sold the rehab facility
Perry’s House experienced two years of success, but in 2015, the program hit a bump in the road. Perry sold the home for $10.65 million.
“That was a Malibu beach house, and it was too expensive to run and the business didn’t really work,” Perry told The Hollywood Reporter. “So we’re looking at smaller places in Santa Monica and Studio City. I’m keeping the business going because I like it; it’s a good way to go help alcoholics.”
Perry has yet to make any public announcement about the facility’s next location or opening date.
He beat up the Canadian Prime Minister
Even before Perry was famous, he was a troublemaker. As he revealed in 2017, he once beat up Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Granted, Perry was a fifth grader in Canada at the time. “I was reminded [of] this [by] my friend Chris Murray, who was also in the fifth grade in Canada…,” he said on Jimmy Kimmel Live. “We both beat him up. I think he was excelling in a sport that we weren’t so it was pure jealousy.”
“I think he was the only kid in school that we could beat up,” Perry quipped. “You know, I’m not bragging about this, this is terrible. I was a stupid kid, I didn’t want to beat him up. In fact, I think at one point I tried to turn it into love play.”
Trudeau later issued a statement asking for a rematch. Perry, who has wised up, declined the invitation. “I was like, ‘Dude—you have an army at your disposal. I’m not going to accept the challenge!’” he said.
No one told him The Odd Couple was canned
In April 2017, Perry tweeted, “My face on the Odd Couple stage door has been painted over with green paint. I think it’s safe to assume that we have been cancelled. #subtle.” The actor essentially revealed to his fans in real time how he found out his big return to a network sitcom was over. On it’s face, that sounds like a harsh way to get fired, but upon closer inspection, it seems Perry was either being naive or just plain deceptive.
Co-star Thomas Lennon had already discussed the end of the show with Cinema Blend the month prior: “I’m sure they would have liked the numbers to have been better, and I would have liked the numbers to have been better.” If The Odd Couple returned, “no one would be more surprised than me,” she said.
Then there’s this report from TV Line, which reported that in November of 2016, CBS “opted not to order an additional back-nine episodes for the series’ third season, capping it at just 13,” an ominous clue that apparently flew right over Perry’s head. It sounds like Perry was maybe playing up the role of unsuspecting victim here a little, but still, we admit that a phone call would have been the classier move for CBS.
He is determined to help others
Despite a personal life filled with numerous ups and downs, Perry continues to transform his troubles into a positive purpose, and for that, he deserves a standing ovation. “My life has a lot more meaning now that I try to help people,” Perry told The Hill. “It’s also a selfish thing—it makes you feel better than anything else will.”
No matter what, he seems to embrace a glass-half-full perspective. “I’ve had a lot of ups and downs in my life and a lot of wonderful accolades,” he told The Hollywood Reporter, “but the best thing about me is that if an alcoholic comes up to me and says, ‘Will you help me stop drinking?’ I will say, ‘Yes. I know how to do that.’”