Matthew Perry, best known for his role of Chandler Bing on the iconic sitcom, Friends, has died at the age of 54 after an apparent drowning. Law enforcement sources told TMZ he was found in his jacuzzi at a home in the Los Angeles area on Saturday. The outlet reports that no foul play is suspected and no drugs were found at the scene. First responders had been called to the residence for cardiac arrest.
Perry was born in Williamstown, Massachusetts, on August 19, 1969, and raised in Ottawa, Canada. He moved to Los Angeles as a teenager to pursue a career in Hollywood. At the age of 24, he landed the role of Chandler Bing. He worked on the show for 10 seasons alongside Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, and David Schwimmer, and earned an Emmy nomination in 2002.
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Matthew Perry On The Set Of "Friends"
“I was 24 when I got on the show,” he said in the 2004 book Friends … ‘Til the End. “I’ll be 34 when it’s over, and those are really important years in somebody’s life. So to do it all in public … was difficult. At first you have the wave of ‘I’m famous, and this is exactly what I’ve wanted my whole life.’ But then you go through the whole recluse stage where you think, ‘I wish everybody would stop staring at me.’ And then you eventually, hopefully, get through all that. You find things in your life that are grounding, like your family and good friends.”
Behind the scenes, Perry struggled with addiction, seeking treatment on multiple occasions. He once told BBC Radio 2 that he was unable to remember filming seasons 3 through 6 of Friends. In recent years, the treatment center, Phoenix House, awarded him for advocacy helping fellow addicts.
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