The One About Matthew Perry Review: Told by Those Who Knew Him Best

Synopsis

Early in his career, a young and unknown Matthew Perry made a desperate plea in Los Angeles: let him become famous, whatever the cost. Few people have had that wish granted so completely, or paid so dearly for it. Perry became one of the best-loved faces in television history through Friends. He died in 2023, aged 54, after relapsing into drug addiction. The One About Matthew Perry, a new three-hour documentary in three parts, follows his whole arc from rise to fall. According to some critics, the film can feel long and could have used a few trims, but it holds attention because of the people it brings together.

A story told by those who loved him

The interviewees include his half-sister Mia and two of his closest friends from his first days in LA, Roger Castillo and David Pressman. They speak about “Matty” with both affection and heartbreak, especially about the addictions he could never fully beat. Mangan notes that this turns the film into a tribute not only to Perry but to the countless addicts, and the families who love them, whose stories never make headlines.

Several ex-girlfriends also appear. Such interviews often turn sour or sensational, but here there is no mud-slinging. They give warm, thoughtful accounts of the man they knew, including his flaws, and the result is a rounded picture rather than a eulogy.

From class clown to Chandler Bing

Perry’s parents divorced when he was a baby. He grew up with his mother in Canada and flew to California to see his father, the actor John Bennett Perry. Mia was born when Matthew was 16, and family photos and footage show how close the two were from the start.

Perry was the class clown from an early age, and he moved to LA to turn that talent into a career. A director spotted him making friends laugh in a restaurant and cast him in A Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon, alongside River Phoenix. Perry later joked that the story would have been better if anyone had seen the film.

Then came 1993 and a script called Friends Like Us. By the time Perry was called to audition, he already knew the lines, because so many fellow actors had asked him to help them prepare. The character of Chandler was so much like him that it seemed written for him. The documentary acknowledges the Friends phenomenon without letting it take over the story, and avoids sentimentality in doing so.

The years of addiction

The later chapters cover his struggles with alcohol, then pills, then the ketamine that first seemed to ease his depression and ultimately killed him. His memoir describes the many attempts to get sober. Here, though, viewers see the pain on the faces of his family and friends as they recall each attempt ending in relapse, never more than a year on.

Mia says their father supported his son through everything, perhaps partly out of guilt over his absence during Matthew’s childhood. He would have wanted to take part in the film, she says, but is now too ill.

A simple, sad story, told with care

The film’s central story is simple and sad, but its candour and intimacy give it depth. It also leaves a lingering regret: that Perry could never fully enjoy his own talent or feel the joy it gave his audiences.