Matthew Perrys Most Shocking Memoir Reveals: Salary Details, Bashing His Skull Open and One

Matthew Perry has been open about his struggles with drugs and alcohol, but goes much deeper in his new memoir, Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing, which is now available. Not only does the actor recount memories of his time on Friends both sober and not buthe also details the many relapses

Matthew Perry has been open about his struggles with drugs and alcohol, but goes much deeper in his new memoir, “Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing,” which is now available. Not only does the actor recount memories of his time on “Friends” — both sober and not — but he also details the many relapses he’s gone through.

After having his first drink at 14, by 18, Perrry was drinking consistently. After Season 2 of “Friends,” Perry traveled to Las Vegas to film “When Fools Rush In”: There, he had a jet ski accident that led to him being prescribed Vicodin, which was the start of his addiction to pills.

At one point, as Perry shares in his book, he was taking 55 Vicodin a day, and had to try various ploys in order to get them. He’d fake migraines or other pain, and sit through MRIs with different doctors. On Sundays, he’d go to open houses and search the medicine cabinets of different homes for any pills he could find.

In 2018, his colon exploded and he was in a coma for two weeks, while his family was told he had a 2% chance to live. He was put on an ECMO machine, along with four others in the hospital; the other four did not survive. He then lived with a colostomy bag for nine months.

Through the years, Perry says he’s attended 6,000 AA meetings, gone to rehab 15 times, been in detox 65 times, has been on life support and has spent between $7-$9 million trying to get sober. He’s had 14 surgeries — his last in January 2022 which left him with a six-inch incision with metal staples.

During COVID, he was at a rehab center in Switzerland and faked pain to get 1,800 milligrams of Oxycontin a day and was having daily ketamine infusions. He then had to get surgery while there and was given a shot of propofol. He woke up 11 hours later in a different hospital and was told that the propofol had stopped his heart for five minutes. The long CPR process also broke eight of his ribs and the doctor refused more meds.

When he left Switzerland, he was told he’d still get the 1,800 milligrams at an L.A. hospital. He paid $175,000 to fly in a private jet home and was told no — the doctor informed him that cancer patients are given 100 mgs. So, he booked another $175,000 private flight that same night back to Switzerland.

This was simply one of his near-death experiences Perry recalled in the book, while also opening up about his personal family relationships, friendships, romances and set experiences. Scroll down for more:

  • The ‘Friends’ Money

    Throughout the book, Perry is open about his finances, detailing how much he spent and made at various parts of his life.

    He had already booked the “LAX 2194” pilot when he got the offer for “Friends,” but eventually got out of it and was paid $22,500 for that one episode. He went on to make more than $1 million a week on “Friends,” thanks to David Schwimmer.

    “It was a decision that proved to be extremely lucrative down the line. David had certainly been in a position to go for the most money, and he didn’t. I would like to think that I would have made the same move, but as a greedy twenty-five-year-old, I’m not sure I would have. But his decision served to make us take care of each other through what turned out to be a myriad of stressful network negotiations, and it gave us a tremendous amount of power,” he wrote. “By season eight, we were making a million dollars per episode; by season ten we were making even more. We were making $1,100,040 an episode, and we were asking to do fewer episodes. Morons, all of us. We had David’s goodness, and his astute business sense, to thank for what we had been offered. I owe you about $30 million, David. (We were still morons.)”

  • And Even More Money…

    He also delves into other financial decisions he’s made in his life: He bought a $20 million apartment “because Bruce Wayne lived in just such an apartment in ‘The Dark Knight,’” he wrote. He was paid $2 million for “Almost Heroes,” Chris Farley’s final movie.

    About Farley’s death in 1997, Perry wrote: “His disease had progressed faster than mine had. (Plus, I had a healthy fear of the word “heroin,” a fear we did not share.) I punched a hole through Jennifer Aniston’s dressing room wall when I found out. I had to promote ‘Almost Heroes’ two weeks after he died; I found myself publicly discussing his death from drugs and alcohol. I was high the entire time.”

    He was paid $1 million for “Fools Rush In,” which he filmed between Seasons 2 and 3 of “Friends.”

    Later on, he was offered $50,000 an episode for 2006’s “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.” His team got the rate up to $175,000. That same year, Perry wrote, Matt LeBlanc was making $600,000 an episode for “Joey.”

    After a successful U.K. run of his play “The End of Longing,” which he wrote and starred in, earned him nearly $600,000, the show moved to New York; he made only $600 for the Off-Broadway run.

  • The Women

    In many of the chapters, Perry recalls his fear of abandonment, which resulted in his ending most romantic relationships before the woman would have the chance to leave. That was the case with Julia Roberts, who he began his flirting with via fax before it turned into a full romance.

    He also recounted going on a date with Cameron Diaz, who he claimed got “stoned” and accidentally punched him in the face. Plus, the summer before “Friends” premiered, he randomly made out with Gwyneth Paltrow inside a closet in Williamstown, Massachusetts.

    During “Fools Rush In,” Perry wrote that Salma Hayek said, “Let’s just spoon a little bit,” in order to bond their characters. He also said her “long-winded ideas” weren’t always helpful.

    He wrote a bit about his crush on Valerie Bertinelli, who was married to Eddie Van Halen, claiming that they did have “a long, elaborate make-out session” one night when her husband passed out after enjoying “the fruits of the vine a little too hard.” Then she acted as though it never happened.

  • What Was Happening on ‘Friends’

    The book includes numerous “Friends” secrets, including the fact that when was a kid, Perry actually created the “Chandler speak” that would later become so famous — as a way to make people laugh.

    By the second half of the series, he “had to beg the producers” to ditch it, along with the sweater vests. “That particular cadence — could it be more annoying? — had been so played out that if I had to put the emphasis in the wrong place one more time, I thought I’d explode, so I just went back to saying lines normally, for the most part in season six and then beyond,” he wrote.

    He wrote that viewers “can track the trajectory” of his addiction from his weight: “When I’m carrying weight, it’s alcohol; when I’m skinny, it’s pills. When I have a goatee, it’s lots of pills.”

    During Season 7, he was living in a sober home, and was driven by the center to and from set each day — including the day he filmed Monica and Chandler’s wedding.

    In between Seasons 8 and 9, he went to rehab and the entire world knew — so, at the first table read back, he was the first to crack a joke about it when all eyes were on him. “Kevin Bright, one of the shows executive producers, had opened the proceedings by saying, ‘Anyone want to talk about their summer vacations?’ and I took the opportunity to break the ice, saying rather loudly and soberly, ‘OK! I’ll start!’ thus releasing all the tension in the room.”

    Season 9 was the only season he was fully sober for — and was the only time he was nominated for an Emmy for the show. He thanked his co-stars multiple times during the memoir, noting that they held him up at his lowest times. Once, Matt LeBlanc nudged him awake when he’d nodded off before a line. Still, he never missed his mark while filming.

    Some of Perry’s “Friends” recollections were more positive: He asked co-creator Marta Kauffman if he could have the last line of the show (which he did). At one point on the series, they considered breaking the metaphorical fourth wall for a scene Perry pitched between him and Sean Penn. It would have taken place during the Halloween episode in which Chandler is dressed as a giant bunny.

    “Sean walks by and I say, ‘Sean, can I talk to you for a second?’ ‘Sure, Matthew, what’s up?’ ‘Well, I’ve been really giving this a lot of thought. And I think you’re a good person to talk to about this,’” Perry wrote. “I’m smoking as I say this, and as I put the cigarette out with my huge bunny foot, I say, ‘I’ve been looking to transition myself into dramatic work.’ Sean Penn looks me up and down for about five beats and just says, ‘Good luck.’”

    While the take got a great laugh, they decided against breaking the show’s rules for that scene.

    Another fun “Friends” tidbit for fans: at one point, wardrobe gave LeBlanc (not Schwimmer!) brown leather pants, which were luckily nixed before filming began.

  • How Bruce Willis Arrived on ‘Friends’

    Perry and Bruce Willis became great friends while filming “The Whole Nine Yards,” but Willis wasn’t sure the movie would be big, while Perry was convinced. They then made a bet — if the movie was a hit, Willis would have to make a guest appearance on “Friends.” See Season 6.

  • He Once Beat Up Justin Trudeau

    When he was 10, as his mom began working for Pierre Trudeau, he “beat up Pierre’s son (an eventual prime minister himself) Justin Trudeau,” Perry wrote. “(I decided to end my argument with him when he was put in charge of an entire army.)”

    Bad boy behavior continued, and one teacher told him, “If you don’t change the way you are, you’ll never amount to anything.” He added, “(Should I admit that when I got the cover of ‘People’ magazine I had a copy of it sent to Dr. Webb with a note that read, “I guess you were wrong”? Nah, that would be crass.) I did.”

  • A Tough Time on ‘Serving Sara’

    After Season 5, Perry’s “Friends” cast and crew — first Jennifer Aniston alone, and later, others — approached him and told them they knew what was going on with him. They wanted to help; he wanted out. So, he told his manager he needed to do a movie.

    He booked “Serving Sara,” which was filming in Dallas. At the time, he was taking methadone (to help with his Vicodin habit), Xanax, cocaine and drinking a full quart of vodka a day. (He later had to dub all of his lines in voiceover for the movie, because his speech was so slurred.)

    Perry went to a detox center, and the movie had to pause — a move he was later sued for, and for which he had to pay $650,000. “Small price to save my life,” he wrote. “Friends” also postponed his scenes at that time.

  • He Had Fentanyl in His System

    After Perry’s colon exploded in 2018 and he had to have a colostomy bag, he was prescribed opiates — which were the reason his colon exploded in the first place. Perry was living at home with a sober companion and a nurse, but was no longer getting high from the amount of drugs he was given. He then turned to a drug dealer to buy Oxy. “The street pills were something like $75 per pill, so I was giving the guy $3,000 at a time, many times a week.”

    He was sent to rehab when on 14 milligrams of Ativan and 60 milligrams of OxyContin; his tests also showed there was fentanyl in his system.

    One night in treatment, he wandered into a hallway: “I’ll never be able to fully explain what happened next, but all of a sudden, I started slamming my head against the wall, as hard as humanly possible… There was blood everywhere. After about eight of these mind-numbing slams, somebody must have heard me, and stopped me, and asked the only logical question: ‘Why are you doing that?’ I gazed at her, and looking like Rocky Balboa from every one of those last scenes, I said, ‘Because I couldn’t think of anything better.’”

  • He Got All New Teeth

    Shortly before the “Friends” reunion filmed, Perry was feeling great and had even quit smoking after a few sessions of being hypnotized. (At one point, he was smoking 60 cigarettes a day.)

    However, he then had a dental emergency.

    “I took a bite into a piece of toast with peanut butter smeared on it, and all my top teeth fell out. Yes, all of them. A quick pop to the dentist was in short order — I am, after all, an actor, and should have all my teeth in my mouth, not in a Baggie in the pocket of my jeans,” he wrote. “But disaster struck and major work was needed. The dentist had to remove every single one of my teeth — including the implants that were nailed into my jaw — and then replace them all with new ones.”

    During ABC’s Oct. 28 “Nightline” interview with Perry, he revealed that the surgery is the reason his speech is slurred on the reunion, as the operation took place days before the HBO Max special filmed.

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