Blog: Lessons From Matthew Perry And Chandler, Through Addiction, Fame

Hey Ira!

"Winter is coming" - as 'Game Of Thrones' fans say. Your first winter in Canada is upon you, buckle up.

But, talking of massively popular TV shows, few would match 'Friends', no? I remember you discovering and loving the series during the Covid lockdown. It's a thing actually - as every new lot of kids approaches adulthood, 'Friends' is 're-discovered' by them, along with its, thoda 'Amriki', thoda universal, life lessons about people, love, friendship, and all the stuff in between.

The sad news for 'Friends' fans was the death of Matthew Perry a few days ago, whom everyone loved as Chandler Bing. He was, of course, amazing in the show.

But what's lovely about Perry is that he wanted to be remembered less as 'Chandler', and more as someone who fought drug and alcohol addiction, and who did what he could to help others fight addiction too. Fighting addiction is often a long losing battle, but he did it with amazing honesty.

Matthew Perry said in his 2022 memoir, 'Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing', that he was an alcoholic by the age of 14. (Fun fact - young Matthew was then a classmate of Canada PM Justin Trudeau, at a school in Ottawa) So, at 25, in 1994, when 'Friends' Season One launched, he was a full blown addict, and remained one through all 10 seasons. 

In 1997, Perry got addicted to the painkiller Vicodin, after an accident. He says that at one point he was having 55 Vicodin pills daily. In 2000, he suffered pancreatitis due to alcohol abuse. In 2001, he halted the shooting of 'Friends' for two months to go into drug and alcohol rehab. He says that towards the later seasons of the show, he was often drunk or high on drugs on the set. His co-stars were supportive and tried to help, but the addiction kept winning.

Some addicts live in denial, while some try to hide it from family, friends and colleagues. Some accept treatment, but (understandably) don't share their experiences in public. But Perry often spoke up about his addictions, his attempts to get sober, about misconceptions and about how addicts could bring themselves to embrace rehab.

In 2002, he told The New York Times, "I got sober because I was worried I was going to die the next day."

In 2011, while announcing another round of rehab, he added - "Please enjoy making fun of me on the World Wide Web." He clearly knew how to take comments about his addiction on the chin. He owned up to it.

In 2013, dipping into his royalties from the re-runs of 'Friends', he opened 'Perry House', a home for sober men. He said he wanted to be able tell an alcoholic that he could help him give it up.

He tweeted about his 2022 memoir, saying - "The highs were high, the lows were low. But I have lived to tell the tale, even though at times it looked like I wouldn't."

And addicts do have tough tales to tell - In 2018, Perry nearly died after a colon burst from opioid abuse. He was in a coma for two weeks. Over the years, he says he had 14 stomach surgeries, 15 trips to rehab, was in therapy for 30 years, and attended 6,000 Alcoholics Anonymous meetings.

Ira, you are studying Psychology, and up ahead, if you take it up professionally, you may work with addicts. You could take some pointers from Matthew Perry - accepting addiction as an illness, accepting the need for medication, rehabilitation, and a support system - part of your work may well involve advocating this.

Let the story of the 'real person' behind the lovable Chandler Bing inspire you to do that.

But hey, there are some takeaways from Perry's Chandler Bing avatar as well. He and his co-stars in 'Friends' also set some cool co-worker goals for us all.

But first, another fun fact - in 1994, Matthew Perry had signed a show called 'LAX 2194', apparently about luggage handlers at Los Angeles airport in the future. Luckily the pilot project didn't work out, and he could join 'Friends', and make TV show history, and lots of moolah!

There's a general belief that work is work, and it's not always important to make friends at work. But I have never believed that. And, I'm happy to report that Matthew Perry and the cool cast of 'Friends' agreed with me.

In USA's ruthless showbiz world, the six stars of 'Friends' - Courtney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Jennifer Anniston, Matt LeBlanc, David Schwimmer, and Perry - surprised everyone by negotiating their acting fees as a group from Season 3, insisting that they all be paid the same amount. And they stuck to that right till the end. From earning 75,000 USD each per episode in Season 3, they took it to 1 Million USD per episode for each of them by Seasons 9 and 10!

Their lawyers and managers may have advised against it, pointing out that some of them could ask for more. For instance, Jennifer Anniston's film career kept growing even during 'Friends', and she had this very high profile marriage to Brad Pitt during the latter seasons, all of which did make her a 'bigger' star. Matthew Perry also got some major film assignments at the same time. Both these guys could have stepped away and demanded higher fees, but they didn't.

Why? Well... because, they were 'Friends', isn't it?

Right through all the 237 episodes of 'Friends' they insisted that the writers and directors gave all six of them equal space and importance in the scripts and plots of the show. Whenever a major magazine profiled 'Friends' as a show, they insisted on posing for pictures 'together'. And, they became pretty good friends off-camera too - Jennifer Anniston is the godmother of Courtney Cox's daughter Coco.

I heard Matthew Perry describing how the other five dealt with his addiction during 'Friends', in an interview. He said they were "...like penguins... when one is sick... the others gather around... and wait it out till the sick one can walk again on his own... and when he can, they go on again..." That is so warm and fuzzy.

Perry had one simple thing to say to people struggling with addiction - You are not alone.

And that's something even those lucky enough not to have an addiction could keep in mind. We are not alone. We have friends.

Lots of Love, 
Papa

(Rohit Khanna is a journalist, commentator and video storyteller. He has been Managing Editor at The Quint, Executive Producer of Investigations & Special Projects at CNN-IBN, and is a 2-time Ramnath Goenka award winner.)

Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author.