I’ve been thinking, after stumbling across a half dozen Friends retrospectives, that of all the Friends, Perry seems closest to his character. Mind you, any time I see the entire cast collected from any long-running show it just seems surreal. We’ve been systematicly conditioned to expect witicisms to blurt out every time they speak. When they “um and err…” like the rest of us, it’s always striking.
Anyway, of the cast of Friends, Perry alone seems to be doing his darndest to remain in character, only without the benefit of writers telling him what to say. So has Perry become a watered down Chandler, or did the writers cater Chandler to fit Perry’s pre-existing humor stylings?
Producer/writer David Crane came first. I grew up with him, and he is Chandler Bing, down to the speech patterns. Except David really is gay (and he’s open about it, it’s not like I’m outing him here).
Well, what do ya know? I kinda figured as much. Perry seems like he probably had some good comic timing coming into the show and has just adopted the Chandler-esque delivery stylings as his own. Perhaps the years of drug abuse have helped blur the boundries between reality and TV for him as well…
I’ve read in numerous articles that Matthew ad-libs a lot and frequently contributes jokes. Not enough to be an actual “writer” but he does have a similiar sense of humour and the writers are open to suggestions. This site even goes so far as to claim he is (well was) the only Friend allowed to attend writers meetings in that capacity.
In some Friends interview or other, I also recall Matthew Perry saying that once actors were cast in roles they each spent time with the producers/writers to get to know the actors better. Matthew Perry said that two of the things that they picked up from his conversations with him was his speaking style, which was the way he and his friends spoke when growing up in Ottawa, and the fact that he was a “not bad looking guy” who had trouble with sustaining relationships with women.