Matthew Perry’s co-stars from the iconic TV show Friends on which he played the character of sarcastic but witty Chandler Bing released a joint statement following his sudden but tragic passing.
“There is so much to say, but right now we’re going to take a moment to grieve and process this unfathomable loss.
“In time we will say more, as and when we are able,” they continued. “For now, our thoughts and our love are with Matty’s family, his friends, and everyone who loved him around the world.”
Perry’s life was a complicated one. While he was always there for those in need of help, especially those who struggled with addictions, he couldn’t help himself.
His battle with alcohol and drug abuse started prior to landing the role of Chandler Bing, and sadly, it continued until the end of his life.
Perry was never married, although he was once engaged and was involved in several relationships, including that with actress Julia Roberts.
“Dating Julia Roberts had been too much for me,” Perry wrote in his memoir. “I had been constantly certain that she was going to break up with me — why would she not? I was not enough; I could never be enough; I was broken, bent, unlovable.”
“So instead of facing the inevitable agony of losing her, I broke up with the beautiful and brilliant Julia Roberts,” he continued. “She might have considered herself slumming it with a TV guy, and TV guy was now breaking up with her. I can’t begin to describe the look of confusion on her face.”
Over the ten years Friends aired, there were plenty of celebrities who guest-starred on the show, including Brad Pitt, Danny DeVito, and Tom Selleck, but Julia Robert’s appearance was Perry’s favorite.
The Pretty Woman star was set to appear on the Superbowl special episode of Friends.
But she had one demand: Being in Matthew’s character, Chandler Bing’s, storyline. However, there was one more thing she wanted from Matthew Perry.
“Matthew asked her to be on the show. She wrote back to him, ‘Write me a paper on quantum physics, and I’ll do it,’” Friends co-creator Kevin Bright told The Hollywood Reporter.
“But first, I had to woo her,” he wrote in his memoir. “Her reply was that if I adequately explained quantum physics to her, she’d agree to be on the show. Wow. First of all, I’m in an exchange with the woman for whom lipstick was invented, and now I have to hit the books.”
“The following day, I sent her a paper all about wave-particle duality and the uncertainty principle and entanglement, and only some of it was metaphorical. Not only did Julia agree to do the show, but she also sent me a gift: bagels — lots and lots of bagels. Sure, why not? It was Julia f—ing Roberts,” he continued.
The two started dating shortly after.
In 2020, he got engaged to literary manager Molly Hurwitz, and he seemed over the moon when he made the announcement public.
“I decided to get engaged,” he said at the time. “Luckily, I happened to be dating the greatest woman on the face of the planet at this time.”
However, when he proposed to her, he was at an expensive Swiss rehab center, and later confessed he was under influence of drugs at the time, and he felt very lonely.
“I bought her a ring because I was desperate that she would leave me,” he wrote, without actually using Hurwitz’s name, I didn’t want to be this injured and alone during Covid. I was high on 1,800 milligrams of hydrocodone when I asked her to marry me, I had even asked for her family’s blessing.”
“Then I’d proposed, high as a kite. And on one knee. And she knew it, too, and she said yes,” Matthew Perry added.
When he returned to LA, he realized what he did. He didn’t even remember proposing.
“I was slowly beginning to realize that I was engaged, lived with a woman and two dogs. Needless to say, I was not ready for any of this. You live with me? We live together?” Perry wrote.
“We have kids’ names picked out, the whole nine yards, which is the name of a movie I once made? ‘You went down on one knee to propose, which really hurt your stomach, remember?’”
A year later, they called off the engagement.
Molly Hurwitz took to Instagram to honor her former fiancé after his passing, writing she will remember him as someone who had a “profound impact” on her life.
“He would love that the world is talking about how talented he was,” she began her post. “And he really was very talented.”
“But, I obviously knew that man in a very different way, too,” she continued, touching on their difficulties during their time together. “While I loved him deeper than I could comprehend, he was complicated, and he caused pain like I’d never known. No one in my adult life has had a more profound impact on me than Matthew Langford Perry. I have tremendous gratitude for that, for everything I learned from our relationship.”
“Matty, I feel relief that you are at peace,” Molly Hurwitz ended her post.
One of Perry’s close friends, Ione Skye, whom he debuted with in the 1988 film A Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon, shared a screenshot of her last conversation with Perry.
“Hi! I hope all is well. I was meditating (I meditate now) and ‘In Your Eyes’ started playing. And I instantly thought of how beautiful you are,” Perry wrote in a text message sent to Skye on October 15, in which he referenced the song from her 1989 film Say Anything, according to People.
She replied, “Awe. I love that. Xo,” to which Perry answered, “Hope you are healthy and happy.”
Further, Ione Skye told Matthew it was “good to hear” from him, saying, “I only have nice memories with you.”
Perry said, “Me too. That one afternoon, I was just sitting in my apartment, and there you were!”
Rest in Peace, Matthew Perry.
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