Come on, you can’t seriously expect speculation on cause of death to be out of bounds in an RIP thread. He was admirably open about his problems, and I don’t think the fact that drug addiction is highly correlated with early death is something that we should not talk about. This is not a family memorial service.
Also - “incredibly tacky” in a thread where people are making “could he BE any more dead” jokes?
I agree. I’m 99% certain that substance abuse at least led to an early death, even if not a present problem. My son’s addiction to alcohol led to his early death just as sure as if he’d injected it directly into his brain. Whether or not Perry had relapsed won’t be answered until there is an autopsy, but his addiction almost certainly killed him.
He has to be near the top of any list of folk who’ve managed the most success that resulted in the least happiness.
My father, a non-drinking, non-drugging (but cigarette-smoking) guy had a major heart attack in his 30s. Perry’s history shows that his drug use had major physical consequences, but sometimes people die without that.
Quote from the man himself. I’m not sure where it’s from:
“I’ve had a lot of ups and downs in my life. I’m still working through it personally, but the best thing about me is that if an alcoholic or drug addict comes up to me and says, ‘Will you help me?’ I will always say, 'Yes, I know how to do that. I will do that for you, even if I can’t always do it for myself! So I do that, whenever I can. In groups, or one on one.
And I created the Perry House in Malibu, a sober-living facility for men. I also wrote my play The End of Longing, which is a personal message to the world, an exaggerated form of me as a drunk. I had something important to say to people like me, and to people who love people like me.
When I die, I know people will talk about Friends, Friends, Friends. And I’m glad of that, happy l’ve done some solid work as an actor, as well as given people multiple chances to make fun of my struggles on the world wide web…
but when I die, as far as my so-called accomplishments go, it would be nice if Friends were listed far behind the things I did to try to help other people.
I know it won’t happen, but it would be nice."
~Matthew Langford Perry
(August 19, 1969 - October 28, 2023)
No one else has mentioned my favorite Matthew Perry film, “Fools Rush In” with Salma Hayek. It’s a really fun romantic comedy.
It’s very sad to see someone die after finally getting their life together. RIP.
I feel slightly bad for titling my thread “Matthew Perry from Friends…”, but it is true.
I saw Lawrence Fishburne talk around the time Matrix 2 came out and he said he was now aware that Morpheus will likely be the very first thing people think of or list when he dies one day. I think he has done a lot, but it would be hard to outdo Morpheus in terms of famous characters.
He was perfect as the despicable Mike Kresteva on The Good Fight.
Reminds me of a line delivered by his “West Wing” co-character, CJ Cregg:
You think I’m not aware that I’m living the first line of my obituary right now?
Thanks for sharing that quote, E_P. It will definitely inform how I think of and remember him.
Others agree.
True. But did that involve the misadventures of shōgun friends in luxurious Tokyo apartments?
Paywalled, unfortunately.
Did he have any straight roles other than West Wing? I haven’t seen everything mentioned in this thread, but I think all the roles have been comedy of some flavor.
Most famous for his voicing of the gangster character “Benny” in Fallout: New Vegas.
The one I was thinking of was Just The Ten Of Us.
Is it? Maybe for Europeans or frequent visitors. In any case, here is the short relevant excerpt from The Daily Telegraph linked above (see post 50).
Excerpt
In the episode of Friends titled The One Where Heckles Dies, Chandler Bing is affected by the death of Mr Heckles, who lived upstairs, and who died, it turns out, lonely and unloved. Chandler becomes terrified that he’ll suffer a similar fate, on account of his shallow tendency to become obsessed with tiny physical and/or psychological details of every potential life partner – weird nostrils, big head, liking the wrong music – whom he ever meets.
By the end of the episode, he seems to have grown spiritually, and determined not to end up like Heckles. However, there’s then a post-credits coda, in which we see Chandler on a date with one of the women whom he has previously written off. She is shot from behind, talking. And you can hear him thinking:
My God, that’s a big head! It didn’t look this big in the office. Maybe it’s the lighting. My head must look like a golf ball at work. All right, don’t get hung up on it. Quick, quick, list five things you like about her. Nice smile, good dresser… big head, big head, big head!
It’s very Friends: set in Central Perk, about relationships, and a bit body-fascist and “problematic” by today’s stentorian standards. It’s also hilarious, primarily because of the brilliant delivery, even in voiceover, of Matthew Perry.
People talk about comedy being about timing, and it is, but timing is only one element of it. That’s like saying that music is all about rhythm. It’s closer to say that comedy is like music in general, and what you need to achieve when you perform it is a complex mix of pace and cadence and emphasis. In comedy, more than music, that’s also about finessing your own mix of those things – creating, that is, your unique comic voice.
This guy must have had the constitution of Keith Richards. An exploded colon?!?!? I know opiate addiction causes GI problems, but that is insane.
RIP, Chandler.
With addiction, there’s almost always a lot that goes on behind the scenes that even close friends may not know about.
Trigger warning; I tried to spoiler the following, and for some reason, the function didn’t work.
While I was never a fan of the hair-band Warrant, I did know that their singer, Jani Lane, drank himself to death, and that his alcoholism basically doomed the band. I did not know until just a couple days ago that according to his ex-wife, he told her one drunken evening that when he was 19, he was raped by a well-known early 1980s rock star (this would have happened ca. 1983) and the band’s manager. This has, of course, led to a lot of speculation as to who they might be. Yeah, he might have done that to himself anyway, but this didn’t help matters.
Corey Haim definitely talked about that too, before he died, as did River Phoenix.