Despite ending its run in 2004, Friends remains one of the biggest shows.
It lives on through streaming, syndication, and fans who dig out their DVDs.
Matthew Perry, who played Chandler Bing on the NBC comedy series, opened up in a new interview with CBC about why he didn’t watch the show despite starring in it.
Perry has been vocal about battling addiction while filming the series, and it turns out, the reason for not watching the show back is related.
“I was taking 55 Vicodin a day, I weighed 128 lbs, I was on Friends getting watched by 30 million people — and that’s why I can’t watch the show, ’cause I was brutally thin,” he said.
What’s more, Perry said he could tell which substance he was struggling with based on the way he looked in any given episode.
“I didn’t watch the show, and haven’t watched the show, because I could go, ‘drinking, opiates, drinking, cocaine,” he recalled.
“I could tell season by season by how I looked. That’s why I don’t wanna watch it because that’s what I see.”
Perry is glad that the show remains popular because it has been introduced to a new generation of fans, and while hasn’t watched it yet, he wants to.
“I think I’m gonna start to watch it, because it really has been an incredible thing to watch it touch the hearts of different generations,” he noted in the interview.
It’s become this important, significant thing. It was really funny and all the people were nice. I’ve been too worried about this, and I wanna watch Friends too.”
Perry’s tell-all book Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing, which released on November 1, found the star opening up about several aspects of his life that he had kept away from the public eye.
He opened up about how he “nearly” died after his colon burst, as well as relationships with celebrities.
Check out the full interview below.
Paul Dailly is the Associate Editor for TV Fanatic. Follow him on Twitter.
