George Clooney Explains Why Matthew Perry 'Wasn't Happy' When Filming 'Friends'
George Clooney has revealed that Matthew Perry really struggled to be happy during his time on Friends.
In a new interview, George, 62, looked back at his friendship with the late Friends star, revealing that Matthew‘s dream was to star in a sitcom, before landing the role of Chandler Bing on the beloved NBC sitcom back in 1994.
However, due to his struggles with drug and alcohol addiction, Matthew had a hard time being happy on the show.
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“He was a kid and all he would say to us, I mean me, Richard Kind and Grant Heslov, was, ‘I just want to get on a sitcom, man. I just want to get on a regular sitcom and I would be the happiest man on earth,’” George recalled to Deadline.
“And he got on probably one of the best ever. He wasn’t happy,” George continued. “It didn’t bring him joy or happiness or peace.”
George – who starred on NBC’s ER in the ’90s – worked in the same studios as Matthew did on Friends, but admitted he had “what was going through” Matthew at the time.
“We just knew that he wasn’t happy and I had no idea he was doing what, 12 Vicodin a day and all the stuff he talked about, all that heartbreaking stuff,” George said, referring to Matthew‘s drug confessions written in his memoir, “Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing.”
“And it also just tells you that success and money and all those things, it doesn’t just automatically bring you happiness,” George noted. “You have to be happy with yourself and your life.”
Also in the interview, George recalled his initial impression of Matthew when they first met.
“I knew Matt when he was 16 years old,” George recalled. “We used to play paddle tennis together. He’s about 10 years younger than me.”
George added, “He was a great, funny, funny, funny kid.”
Matthew was found dead in his jacuzzi back on October 28. He was 54-years-old. The medical examiners office just recently revealed that Matthew died from “acute effects of ketamine.”
Matthew was “reportedly clean for 19 months” prior to his death.