The creator of the hit sitcom, Friends , Marta Kauffman, recently addressed some of the severe struggles that Matthew Perry faced with sobriety throughout filming the show.
Matthew Perry has always been transparent with fans about his struggles with addiction.
While he may have appeared to be a quirky ’90s heartthrob at the height of his career, he was actually spending a lot of time in and out of rehab.
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In 2016, he admitted that he hardly even remembers filmimg seasons three through six.
“I think the answer is, I don’t remember three years of it,” he told BBC Radio.
He revealed that his issues with addiction began after a jet ski accident.
He eventually became dependent on painkillers.
“It wasn’t my intention to have a problem with it,” he said . “But from the start I liked how it made me feel, and I wanted to get more.”
“I was out of control and very unhealthy.”
In hindsight, it’s clear that Matthew’s weight was significantly fluctuating from season to season.
“I returned to my original birth weight,” he joked .
Despite checking himself into rehab in 1997 and 2000 for 28 days, rock bottom came for Matthew in 2001.
Not long after getting out of rehab, he relapsed and ended up spending two weeks in the hospital for pancreatitis, caused by alcohol abuse, he said.
“Unfortunately, that still wasn’t enough to get me to quit drinking.”
He confessed to frequently showing up to work drunk or brutally hungover — unable to function normally, which ultimately, led to him finally asking his parents for help.
“It was scary. I didn’t want to die,” he said. “But I’m grateful for how bad it got. It only made me more adamant about trying to get better.”
He spent two and a half months back in rehab, learning “that a happy life is possible without alcohol or drugs.”
In 2011, he checked himself back into rehab as a precautionary measure.
“I’m making plans to go away for a month to focus on my sobriety and to continue my life in recovery. Please enjoy making fun of me on the World Wide Web,” he said at the time.
“I’ve had a lot of ups and downs in my life and a lot of wonderful accolades,” he told the Hollywood Reporter in 2015.
“But the best thing about me is that if an alcoholic comes up to me and says, ‘Will you help me stop drinking?’ I will say, ‘Yes. I know how to do that’.”
“When I was in big trouble, it was so public,” he went on.
“Because I was on a TV show that 30 million people were watching.”
“The fact that I [am] on TV makes people listen a little bit more,” he said.
“So I take advantage of that from time to time.”
Since then, he’s managed to keep a relatively low profile.
He did make a surprise appearance, however, on Jennifer Aniston’s brand new Instagram profile in a Friends reunion photo.
He was also featured in a selfie on Instagram with another one of his “Friends” co-stars, Courteney Cox.
“Guess who I had lunch with today,” she captioned the photo. “I KNOW!! Could I BE any happier? #realfriends.”
In a more recent interview with Us Weekly at the Producer Guild Awards, the creator of “Friends”, Marta Kauffman, addressed Matthew’s sobriety struggles while filming the show.
She revealed that she and the rest of the cast were aware of what he was going through and did everything they could to support him.
We were certainly aware of some of it and we certainly had some conversations about it,” she said.
“[We were] protective and, hopefully, supportive,” she added .
