Matthew Perry Said Jennifer Aniston Reached Out to Him Most During His Battle With Alcohol Addiction

Editor's note: This article was originally published on September 5, 2023. It has since been updated.

Matthew Perry, 54, passed away after allegedly drowning, reported Sky News. The 54-year-old actor was unresponsive by his assistant who had returned from an errand. He passed away at his Pacific Palisades home in Los Angeles. The Los Angeles Police had received a 911 call at 4.07 pm local time and no foul play is suspected at the moment. The cops have opened an investigation into the incident. The 'Friends' actor was found by his assistant who had gone out for an errand just hours before his death. He had just reportedly returned home from a two-hour round of pickleball before sending his assistant out on an errand, reported Parade. Matthew Perry was open about his battles with addiction in interviews and in his book.

Matthew Perry mentioned that, during his struggle with drug addiction, Jennifer Aniston was the one who reached out to him the most. Perry has continued to openly share his experiences on his extensive path to sobriety, shedding light on the challenges he faced while working on NBC's Friends. Throughout this period, he oscillated between addictions to Vicodin and alcohol. In an excerpt from his latest book, Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing, Perry reflects on a pivotal moment when his co-star Jennifer Aniston visited his trailer. This encounter served as a wake-up call, revealing that his discreet struggles with alcohol were not as concealed as he had believed, reported Entertainment Tonight.

"'I know you're drinking,' she said,'' How can you tell?' I said. I never worked drunk. 'I've been trying to hide it..'" Diane Sawyer, the ABC News anchor conducted an exclusive interview with Perry in anticipation of his book launch. In this one-hour special which aired on ABC. Perry provides insights into the behind-the-scenes aspects of Friends and recounts a near-death encounter that plunged him into a coma lasting almost 14 days. "Imagine how scary a moment that was, [Aniston] was the one who reached out the most, and I'm really grateful to her for that," he told Sawyer.

In another part of the excerpt from his memoir, Perry emphasized that he never performed his duties while under the influence of drugs or alcohol (although there were occasions when he worked with a hangover). He credited his ability to contribute effectively to the immensely successful Friends ensemble to the support of his castmates. He likened their support to a group of penguins rallying around an injured member, helping to keep him on his feet.

"I was the injured penguin, but I was determined to not let these wonderful people and this show down," he wrote. However, during that specific visit to Perry's trailer, Aniston straightforwardly conveyed to him that he was not escaping scrutiny or consequences for his actions. "'We can smell it,' she said, in a kind of weird but loving way, and the plural 'we' hit me like a sledgehammer," Perry wrote.

As per information from Insider, Perry's path to recovery was marked by other frightening incidents, one of which involved a near-death experience when he revealed that his colon nearly ruptured due to his opioid consumption. As previously covered by Insider, the actor shared details of this life-threatening incident, which occurred when he was 49 years old, in his memoir.

During the event, Perry refrained from publicly disclosing the cause of the perforation. In private, he mentioned that his doctors had given him a mere "2% chance of survival." "I was put on a thing called an ECMO machine, which does all the breathing for your heart and your lungs. And that's called a Hail Mary. No one survives that," he said.