‘Feels like I’m losing a son’: Friends director reveals what made Matthew Perry ‘extraordinary’
The global outpouring of grief over actor Matthew Perry’s shocking death is no surprise to those who knew him best.
Perry brought an unvarnished humanness to his role as Chandler Bing on the mega hit Friends and forged a deep connection with the show’s international audience.
According to the man who directed the TV show’s pilot and several other episodes, James Burrows, audiences related to Chandler due to the character being enmeshed with Matthew Perry.
“You know he stepped into that character about 40 per cent Matt and 60 per cent Chandler,” Burrows told 60 Minutes.
“Then it grew to 60 per cent Matt and 40 per cent Chandler.”
There is a particular scene in Friends where the director thinks Perry epitomised this unique injection of himself into Chandler.
It’s when Chandler is stuck in a blackout in an ATM vestibule with Victoria’s Secret model Jill Goodacre.
“It was a wonderful moment, and my favourite scene,” Burrows said.
Perry’s ingenuity was seen through his creation of Chandler’s quirks, which have since been impersonated by the masses.
“Matthew had a way of taking a great line and making it extraordinary by putting emphasis on the wrong syllable,” Burrows said.
Life imitated art on the set of Friends with the cast and crew forming lifelong relationships.
For Burrows, Perry’s death has been exquisitely painful.
“I consider the cast a family, so it feels like I’m losing a son,” he said.
Speculation swirled surrounding the cause of Perry’s death after he was found unresponsive in his jacuzzi on October 28.
Fans feared drugs and alcohol could have been involved in his death.
Perry revealed the depths of his battle with addiction in his 2022 autobiography, Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing.
Though the rest of the world was only exposed to the intricacies of his addiction a year ago, his castmates lived through his struggles.
“The cast were protective of him and took care of him. Again the six of them were a family, and helped Matt as much as they could help him,” Burrows said.
For Burrows, Perry’s death was particularly shocking considering the actor’s recent period of good health.
“Matthew had his problems but he was showing the best side of himself over the past couple of years, so it was unexpected,” he said.
Underneath Perry’s humour was a man capable of deep empathy.
This was highlighted through the actor’s founding of a sober house to take care of people in the grips of addiction.
The loss of his profoundly sympathetic friend is heart wrenching, with only a few things easing the burden.
“I’ll be watching a lot more Friends than I used to watch, you know, so I will be able to see him. I’ll always have that,” he said.
