"Could it 'BE' any more tragic?" - A Eulogy (of sorts) for Matthew Perry aka Chandler Bing

Monday is about movies. And/or TV. Star of both, Matthew Perry, is dead. Aged 54. Despite my cruel riff in the title, seriously, could it be any more tragic?

Sunday arvo, NZ time, the news comes through that Matthew Perry has died. Celebrities started tweeting almost far too quickly about how the troubled soul could now hopefully find some peace. There was news that he had drowned - when you add in his known struggles with drugs, alcohol, and mental health, you can almost be mad at the tabloids for leading you down the path to considering the death a suicide. Since then, there’s been some updates almost completely debunking that. By the time you read this there’ll be another story out about how it was a combination of the exercise he did beforehand, and the weakened heart from all that coke and booze…

None of this really matters.

Matthew Perry, 54, is dead. He was one of the stars of Friends. He was Chandler Bing. The wisecracker. He had the killer lines, and was quick with a jibe. The cut of his jib was somewhat glib - but he hit those line-readings hard. And people loved him, and the other “Friends” for the way they made their characters sing.

Look, I fucking hated Friends. But before I fucking hated Friends, I kinda almost loved it. For a bit. Back then, it was appointment viewing. Maybe, to begin with, because Seinfeld or something like it was on after, but it was almost a little cute for a while. Me and my actual friends would get together, every Wednesday night, we’d huddle around the TV - we might have had our first bourbon or our third beer in our hand. And we watched Friends. Together. Always together. We laughed. We loved it. We went from tolerating it, to really digging it.

And that was a special time in my life. A troubled time too. Kinda. But a special time. Some of the friends I watched Friends with are now just acquaintances on social media. We might sneak a glimpse of each others lives now and then but we don’t really know each other. Some of the friends I watched Friends with I’m not at all friends with now. We could walk past each other in the street and on both sides we’d be fumbling for our phones to make it look like we’d just received the most important notification that was absolutely keeping our head down and focused. But at least half of the friends I watched friends with - it was a big group of us, all up - are friends for life. We check in every week. We might not see each other as often we we’d like, but a quarter-century on we are in each others lives. We know and love one another.

So, even though I very quickly grew to dislike Friends, or outgrew it, or whatever, it was a bonding agent. It was a big part of my life for a small time. Of all of them, Chandler seemed the most insufferable, the most implausible, the most unlikeable. But as the friend in my group most likely to want to try for a joke, or hit a line super hard (not the drug kind of ‘line’ by the way), I kinda liked the character of Chandler for a little while too.

I wrote a bit about Friends early in the life of this Substack newsletter - back when they had that rather sad, patchy, odd reunion.

That reunion was deeply troubling to me. It felt uncomfortable watching it. Matthew Perry was the least comfortable there, the least successful since Friends.

Perry had had a show he’d tried to get off the ground, and a few movies. They’d all struggled for a time. Jennifer Aniston was first to succeed with films - but it took a long time. David Schwimmer went straight back to the theatre, and directed a couple of great films and popped up for a cameo or two in things like Curb Your Enthusiasm. Matt Le Blanc was stuck being Joey - even starring in a spinoff which was like a big balloon deflating further with each episode. Lisa Kudrow was forever Phoebe. Like Le Blanc with Joey. Like Perry with/as Chandler. Then Kudrow and Le Blanc both got gigs playing extended/exaggerated versions of themselves. And this seemed to hit better. Courtney Cox was largely fine too - the Scream franchise certainly helped for a time. It’s more now that she seems to be looking for her legacy project…

But Matthew Perry couldn’t shake Chandler. And he couldn’t shake his addictions.

Earlier this year, I read his book. I could not say I ‘enjoyed’ it - it was grim. Deeply troubling really, super sad. But it was fascinating. He reminded us that he wasn’t just Chandler Bing. He was briefly THE BIGGEST STAR ON THE PLANET. And if you’d like to argue against that, it’s worth reading his reminder. He was the star of the number one show on TV, had the number one movie (remember The Whole Nine Yards? I never saw the fuss. I did see the film. It was shit. But it WAS big). And he was dating Julia Roberts! Such things clearly mattered to Matthew. All through his book he judged himself and hyped himself around who he was seeing, who he had shagged, who he wished he had shagged, and how big his ‘hitlist’ was. This was super sad to read, super gross, super…ficial.

But that was his world.

The book also made a case for him as the hard working actor who had blink-and-you’ll-miss them appearances on all manner of the shows we watched growing up: Charles In Charge, Silver Spoons, Growing Pains, Who’s The Boss? , Beverly Hills, 9021. Sometimes there was a multi-episode character-arc. Again, even after Friends he eventually got to do some decent work on The Good Wife, and its later partial-spinoff, The Good Fight.

He fought at his craft - and the story around netting Friends is interesting, not least because he beat out one of his real friends; or in fact the guy turned it down and then Perry was able to snatch the role. He lost a friend to become a Friend.

Through it all, he was the kid of messed up houses, and malaise. Bored to drink. Bored to drugs. All aboard for both. And then came fame. And he handled that by clutching harder to his vices.

It was a grim story. And now it has its grim end.

And until you know those details, and for many that wasn’t until yesterday or today even, reading of his death, you tend to go ‘yeah, but he’s famous and successful and wealthy, so that’s all his problem - he’s duly compensated, he’ll find a way…’

Or something like that.

I guess that was my revelation in reading his book. The grim reality that someone that famous and successful could never be happy. I’ve heard that story before. We know it exists. We know it will happen again. (The Whitney Houston story has some parallels - but sadly, the initial headline around death by drowning is likely the only comparison people will choose to see).

Matthew Perry, at one point, is sitting on Late Night With David Letterman. He’s nervous to be there of course. And it’s the host - the legendary comedian that changed late night TV for a generation - who has to point out to Perry how successful he is: the number one show and film at the same time. The famous movie-star girlfriend…

It’s not enough. It was never enough. It was never what mattered. It was never the cure. It was never entirely - or correctly - appreciated. And that was all due to some hideous monster. The curse of genetics. And the crutch of a lifetime. Not actually a crutch, rather the catalyst for more falls, for further accidents.

At the end of his book he nonchalantly says he is into collecting art. Has a Rothko. Might get another. I’m sure I’ve never read a sadder sentence. Nothing could work for this guy. Could he ‘BE’ any unhappier?

I didn’t really love his work at all. But I felt strangely affected by the news of Perry’s death. The final sentence to his autobiography in a way. It was never going to end in happier circumstances. It gives me no great feeling to say that. And when someone is 54, and you’re suddenly not that much younger than that yourself, you have even more cause to pause, to worry, to wonder. To lament. Not every hero of your generation is a personal hero. That doesn’t make them unimportant. Then there’s the fact that every human life should be considered important. Right?

No one told Perry life would be this way. But you get the feeling he knew it was always going to play out the way it did for him. I said to someone, immediately after hearing the news, that his book had felt like a long, slow, sad suicide note written in advance.

Can’t make any jokes about that. Can’t say you never cared about the guy’s work. That’s a human being lost and crying out. And to think that Friends reunion just paraded him for an hour on the stage like a freak.

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“I’m not great at the advice…Can I interest you in a sarcastic comment?”

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R.I.P. Matthew Perry