“Friends” actor Matthew Perry, who tragically passed away at 54, once offered a peculiar prayer to God, one that, in his death, leaves much upon which to reflect. We don’t know much about the state of Perry’s heart. Was he a believer? Did he know God? Still, the celebrity was open about the struggles that frequented much of his star-studded existence.
By the time he was 18, Perry was a full-fledged alcoholic after starting to drink at 14, a heartbreaking reality he detailed in his memoir, “Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing,” published just last year. Perry also struggled with an opioid addiction. His abuse of alcohol and other drugs was so prevalent that its consequences were visible, tragically detailed on the show, which made him a 1990s icon as Chandler Bing.
He told Tom Power last year, “I finally felt at home, for the very first time, as soon as I drank alcohol. I have a drink, and, for the first time in three weeks, life seems to make sense.” Alcohol’s sneaky power and the way it changes the perspectives and feelings of those who drink it gripped Perry like a vice, and he thought fame would give him the help he needed. So he prayed to become a celebrity, and he got his answer.
He told Power, “That prayer was, ‘Please, God, make me famous. You can do anything you to me; just make me famous.’ Three weeks later, I got ‘Friends,’ and God didn’t forget about the second part.” The beloved sitcom granted him the fame he wanted, but it did nothing to curb his alcohol addiction. He reflected, “Alcoholism didn’t care that I was on ‘Friends.’ Alcoholism wants you alone; it wants you sick; and then it wants to kill you.” At one point, Perry’s addiction to other drugs was so deep-seated that, in addition to drinking, he started taking 50 Vicodins a day and weighed only 128 pounds.
While the ‘Friends’ storyline chronicled the lives of a group of friends navigating life in New York, for Perry, it documented the ebbs and flows of his addiction. He said the evidence of his struggle was so loud that he couldn’t watch the series. Perry said, “I was on ‘Friends,’ getting watched by 30 million people, and that’s why I can’t watch the show.” However, Perry did say last November that he planned to start watching the series that made him a household name.
He said, “It’s become this important, significant thing. I’ve been too worried about this, and I, you know, I want to watch ‘Friends’ too.” Still, Perry said ‘Friends’ wasn’t what he wanted for his legacy. Instead, in sobriety, Perry wanted people to remember him as one who helped others stop drinking and turn away from opioid abuse. He said, “The best thing about me, bar none, is if somebody comes up to me and says, ‘I can’t stop drinking. Can you help me?’ I can say yes and follow up and do it.”
Perry continued, “And I’ve said this for a long time: when I die, I don’t want ‘Friends’ to be the first thing that’s mentioned. I want [helping people] to be the first thing that’s mentioned, and I’m going to live the rest of my life proving that.” As far as faith is concerned, Perry told HBO’s “Real Time” host Bill Maher last year he has “a very close relationship” with a “higher power.”