“How’s Matthew Perry doing?”
Over the many years since I was first asked, it’s been, at different times, the most asked question for me. I understand why so many people asked it: they love Matthew and they want him to be OK. Me too. But I always bristled at that question from the press, because I couldn’t say what I wanted to say: “It’s his story to tell and I’m not authorized to tell it really, am I!” I would have wanted to go on to say, “This is very intimate personal stuff and if you don’t hear it from the actual person, it is, to my mind, gossip and I’m not gossiping about Matthew with you.” Knowing that no response at all could do more damage, sometimes I would just say, “I think he’s doing well.” At least that doesn’t amplify the spotlight and maybe he can have a fraction of privacy as he tries to deal with this disease. But truly, I wasn’t exactly sure how Matthew was doing. As he’ll tell you in this book, he was keeping it a secret. And it took some time for him to feel comfortable enough to tell us some of what he was going through. Over those years I didn’t really try to intervene or confront him, because the little I knew about addiction was that his sobriety was out of my hands. And yet, I would have periods of wondering if I was wrong for not doing more, doing something. But I did come to understand that this disease relentlessly fed itself and was determined to keep going.
So, I just focused on Matthew, who could make me laugh so hard every day, and once a week, laugh so hard I cried and couldn’t breathe. He was there, Matthew Perry, who is whip smart … charming, sweet, sensitive, very reasonable and rational. That guy, with everything he was battling, was still there. The same Matthew who, from the beginning, could lift us all up during a grueling night shoot for the opening titles inside that fountain. “Can’t remember a time I wasn’t in a fountain!” “What are we, wet?” “Can’t remember a time I wasn’t wet … I!” (Matthew is the reason we are all laughing in that fountain in the opening titles.)
After Friends I didn’t see Matthew every day, and I couldn’t even hazard a guess with regard to his well-being.
This book is the first time I’m hearing what living with and surviving his addiction really was. Matthew has told me some things, but not in this kind of detail. He’s now letting us into Matthew’s head and heart in honest and very exposed detail. And finally, no one needs to ask me or anyone else how Matthew’s doing. He’s letting you know himself.
He has survived impossible odds, but I had no idea how many times he almost didn’t make it. I’m glad you’re here, Matty. Good for you. I love you.