While playing Chandler in "Friends," Matthew Perry spent years of his life struggling with addiction — including taking 55 Vicodin pills per day at one point.
This is his story.
This is his story.
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Short filmTranscript
00:00Made a rule that I would never drink or take anything at work. I would never do that, but I would show up
00:08blindly hungover like shaking
00:18Chandler I make jokes when I'm uncomfortable
00:31I
00:33Friends was huge and I couldn't jeopardize that as I loved my co-actors. I loved the scripts
00:39I loved everything about the show, but I was also struggling with my addictions which only added to my sense of shame. I
00:46Had a secret and no one could know
01:01I
01:11She would walk in I'd be like, hey good to see you and I'd go to my dressing room just go
01:16I'll never I'll never be able to be with her
01:31I
01:44I'm not great at the advice
01:46Can I interest you in a sarcastic comment? What am I not boyfriend material? No, you're Chandler
01:53You know
01:55Chandler
01:57Okay, so we've established my name and hit me
01:59I
02:23How did you get the courage to fight the addiction to Vicodin well
02:26You know you get into a place in your life where you're having a problem and you either lie down about it or step
02:31up to bat and take your swing and that's what I did what saved me was was finally getting a little bit of clarity in
02:36My life and realizing that this was this was it if I keep living my life this way there isn't gonna be any life
02:57You
03:10We you know
03:12We weren't equipped we weren't
03:16To deal with it, you know, nobody had ever dealt with with that
03:27And I said how I thought I was hiding it so well and she said we can smell it and we can smell it
03:46I now pronounce you husband and wife. Oh wait
03:52Do you take each other I do I do yeah you do
03:57You
04:18It's been pretty well documented that I had some I had some problems with alcoholism and
04:22Addiction and before this movie was over. I I left the film to go get help
04:26My character is a drunk and I used to drink a lot. And so I'm familiar with that
04:32Is it challenging for you playing that role? No, it's been fun. Yeah. Yeah, is it cathartic?
04:38It's been a little bit cathartic. Yeah
04:40You
04:54My life has gone to such low degrees with addiction that the lower the scale I go
05:00The more helpful I can be to other people who have gone so low