Actress Minnie Driver remembered her longtime friend, Matthew Perry, in an obituary in which she said the beloved actor — her co-star in a 2003 stage play — was “ruthlessly funny” and self-deprecating but had an “inner struggle” when it came to his legacy and Friends.
“Part of Matthew’s inner struggle was that he was so closely identified with a role that was also beloved to him,” Driver said of Perry in an obituary published by the Guardian.
“But it also held him in a specific place, so it felt like a tug of war,” she added. “I also think if you struggle with addiction and you have this extraordinary, rarefied life where people love you so completely, it’s always difficult to come to terms with the possibility of your fallibility.”
The Good Will Hunting actress went on to say, “Everything that we loved about Chandler was in there in Matthew, but it was just the tip of the iceberg.”
“He was that funny, charming and self-deprecating, but also much more. He had such a wealth of soul,” Driver said of Perry, whom she acted alongside in David Mamet’s play Sexual Perversity in Chicago.
“He was like a light,” Driver added of the late Friends star. “He was one of those people who just made other people feel good. Somehow, they don’t suck you down into their sadness, or their pain, and I know now that his pain was great.”
Perry, forever immortalized as Chandler Bing on the hit 1990s sitcom Friends, was found dead on October 28 at the age of 54 under the water in a hot tub at his Los Angeles home.
While early reports speculated the actor may have drowned — with others surmising he might have taken illicit drugs, given his history of addiction and substance abuse — an autopsy report released on December 15 revealed that Perry died due to acute effects of ketamine.
Drowning, coronary artery disease, and buprenorphine, which is used to treat opioid use disorder, were also listed as contributing factors. Perry had reportedly undergone ketamine therapy for depression.
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