“Friends” actor Matthew Perry struggled with loneliness and sadness before passing away from a ketamine overdose on Oct. 28, 2023, his family says.
On an Oct. 28 interview with the “Today” show marking the first anniversary of Perry’s death, his mother, Suzanne Morrison, said that despite having a bright spirit, the actor was “very lonely in his soul.” Perry’s stepfather, Keith Morrison, added that beneath Perry’s outgoing personality, there was a deeper, unseen side to him.
“The sort of exterior that people know about hid an insecure and often very sad guy,” Keith Morrison said.
Perry opened up about his decades-long struggles with drug addiction and alcoholism in his 2022 memoir, “Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing.”
“Even when he was struggling in dark times, we were always proud of him, we were always proud of the fact that he kept fighting,” Perry’s sister Caitlin Morrison said in the interview. “And that he made it a big focus of his life to help other people.”
Perry’s mother said she learned of Perry’s death through a phone call where she was told, “Your son is dead.” She recounted a conversation she had with Perry shortly before he died in which he appeared to have some sense of what was going to happen to him, she said.
“He came up to me and said, ‘I love you so much and I’m so happy to be with you now.’ It was almost as though it was a premonition or something,” Suzanne Morrison said. “There was an inevitability to what was going to happen next to him, and he felt it very strongly.”
But Perry was “not frightened anymore,” his mother said, adding that his attitude worried her. “I think it was this new medication that he was on,” she said.
The American-Canadian, who grew up in Ottawa, was known internationally for his role as Chandler Bing in the television sitcom “Friends.”
Perry was found unresponsive in a heated pool at his home in Pacific Palisades, California, a year ago. An autopsy report previously obtained by The Epoch Times listed “acute effects of ketamine” as the cause of Perry’s death, along with drowning and other conditions.
Perry’s family and friends founded the Matthew Perry Foundation of Canada, which was launched in Ottawa on Oct. 24, to help others struggling with addiction. The organization, led by Perry’s sister Caitlin Morrison, offers support and research focused on recovery-based programs.
“Addiction is a fierce illness. I have watched it entrap its victims and keep them in its grip. I watched my son try and try everything, every available treatment, and yet fall back again and again,” wrote Perry’s mother on the foundation’s website.
“Addiction tears its way through families, ruins friendships, destroys careers and cuts short lives that should have been long, productive and happy,” she added. “I am so proud of his sister Caitlin, as she helps lead the Matthew Perry Foundation of Canada in the hunt for new solutions–and for the kind of help that will save lives.”
