From Chandler’s Cadence to Problems with Addiction: 8 Revelations from Matthew Perry’s Memoir

In Matthew Perry’s new memoir Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing, the author-actor spends most of the 250 pages discussing the big terrible thing. For the first time ever, he chronicles his addiction in great detail; Perry’s struggles with alcohol and painkillers have been public knowledge for decades, but the book reveals just how close he came to the brink — and how often.

Most of these revelations made headlines in the days and weeks leading up to the memoir’s Oct. 28 release, including those at the peak of his addiction (and during many of the friends years) he took 55 Vicodin pills daily; that several years ago he was in a coma and had dozens of surgeries to repair his exploded colon; and be that friends Co-stars, most notably Jennifer Aniston, continued to reach out to him and offer help after the show’s finale (Lisa Kudrow writes the foreword for the book).

But Perry also dedicates time to the book to reflect on his high-profile acting career. It’s not a Hollywood devil in the traditional sense (most tell is exhausted with its tales of constantly coming back from the abyss), but offers very specific trivia that even the most diehard will know friends Fan wouldn’t know. Here are a few key revelations from Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing.

He should be there Don’t look up

While the Netflix climate apocalypse satire was in development, Perry met with one Adam McKay, which led to an offer of a role. He was set to play a Republican journalist in a small role that required several scenes with Meryl Streep (who played a comically narcissistic US President). Perry was due to embark on another stint in rehab – this time in Switzerland, much further afield than on his previous visits – and recently fractured eight ribs while having CPR. He took 1,800 milligrams of hydrocodone but flew to Boston to film. He was working on a group scene with Jonah Hill that never made it to screen and had to leave the set due to his injuries before working with Streep. “It was heartbreaking,” he writes. “But I was in too much pain.”

Chandler’s speaking style began at the audition

Perry says so when he auditioned for the role of Chandler – the final character to be cast friends Co-creator Marta Kauffman, he “broke all the rules”. First, he opted not to carry the physical script pages with him, which is a common practice that certifies to the writer that the script is a work in progress. He also “read the words in unexpected ways and hit intonations no one else had.” He got laughs where none of the actors under consideration laughed, and the role was his. Eventually, in later years, he begged the producers to drop Chandler’s verbal tic for the final few seasons. “That particular cadence – it could be be even more annoying? — was so played I thought I’d explode if I had to put the wrong emphasis in the wrong place again,” he writes.

Courteney Cox set the collegial tone friends set to

When the sitcom began filming, Cox was by far the most famous of the group thanks to her roles in Ace Ventura and family ties. But on the day the six co-stars first gathered at the Warner Bros. Los Angeles lot, Cox said over lunch, “There are no stars here. This is an ensemble show. We should all be friends.” As Perry explains, she’d seen a similar dynamic during a guest appearance His field — something he credits with sparking the group’s eventual inseparability.

Perry’s relationship with Julia Roberts began with a fax about quantum physics

For the second season, NBC planned a major post-Super Bowl episode of friendsand Julia Roberts agreed to guest star – if she could be part of Chandler’s plot. Marta Kauffman forwarded this to Perry, along with a suggestion that they send her flowers. He did, along with a card that read, “The only thing more exciting than the prospect of you doing the show is that I finally have an excuse to send you flowers.” She replied by fax, that she would only agree to the show if he “explained quantum physics adequately” to her. And so her fax flirt was born. (He found a treatise on wave-particle duality and the uncertainty principle that came across it.)

friends almost broke the fourth wall in season eight

During Sean Penn’s two-episode guest appearance, Perry cast a closing scene for the Halloween episode, which began with him backstage in the infamous pink bunny costume. “Sean comes over and I’m like, ‘Sean, can I talk to you for a minute?'” he writes. “‘I’ve thought about it a lot and I think you’re a good person to talk about.’ I smoke as I say this, and as I stub out the cigarette with my giant rabbit foot, I say, ‘I was trying to turn myself into the dramatic work.’ Sean Penn looks me up and down for about five bars and just says, ‘Good luck.’” friends had a firm rule of never breaking the fourth wall.

David Schwimmer proposed a group contract negotiation

friends made headlines for their collective million-dollar-per-episode paydays prior to final season. But according to the memoir, bargaining began on set thanks to a suggestion from Schwimmer in season one. Perry continues to write the actor who played Ross friends — and was the show’s breakout star in those early episodes (he was also the first to do a commercial, get his own movie, and buy his own house) — came into Perry’s dressing room and proposed re-signing their contracts as a team negotiate and insist that they all get the same amount. “It was a decision that proved extremely lucrative across the board,” says Perry. “David was certainly able to get most of the money and he didn’t. … It gave us tremendous power. In season eight, we made a million dollars an episode; in season 10 we did even more.”

Perry never filmed friends while high

The actor is raw and honest about the many times he has used, but claims he never used on set. “I’ve never been high while I was working,” he writes. “I loved those people — I always wanted to stand up for them, and I was second baseman for the New York Yankees.” He does, however, talk about the number of times he’s worked hungover. At one point during the show, Jennifer Aniston came into his trailer to tell him that the cast knew he had been drinking because they could smell it on him. He also took limousines to set when he was too hungover to drive, which he says got him some “doubtful” looks: “Everyone would ask me if I was alright, but nobody would stop me friends train because it was such a moneymaker.”

Season nine of friends was the only one where Perry was completely sober

The actor filmed the season 7 finale, which featured Chandler and Monica’s wedding, while he was living in a Malibu rehab facility. By the summer after season eight, he was clean again, and Perry says he stayed so throughout season 9, which he cites as his most successful on the show — it was also the only season he was nominated for a best Actor Emma. “What have I done differently this season? I heard. I didn’t just stand there and wait my turn,” he writes. (While recently promoting his book, Perry shared That New York Times He had been clean for 18 months, which means he was drug and alcohol free when the friends The reunion aired in May 2021. “I probably spent $9 million or so getting sober,” he estimated.)