Matthew Perry reveals why he broke up with Julia Roberts in the ‘90s
Matthew Perry revealed that he broke up with Julia Roberts in the ’90s because he felt like he would “never be enough” for her.
The 53-year-old actor got candid about how his own mental turmoil lead to the end of their relationship after just two months in his new memoir, “Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing.”
The “Friends” star says that he and the 54-year-old actress had started dating by the time Roberts had a cameo on an episode of the hit sitcom — but things quickly took a turn for the worse.
“Dating Julia Roberts had been too much for me. I had been constantly certain that she was going to break up with me,” Perry wrote in an excerpt published by the Times UK, adding that he felt the “Pretty Woman” star was “slumming it” by dating him.
“Why would she not? I was not enough; I could never be enough; I was broken, bent, unlovable. So instead of facing the inevitable agony of losing her, I broke up with the beautiful and brilliant Julia Roberts,” he confessed.
The “Whole Nine Yards” actor says he can’t “begin to describe the look of confusion on her face” after he broke things off.
The whirlwind romance blossomed after Roberts, who went onto wed Danny Moder, claimed she would “only do the show” if she got to be a part of Perry’s character’s storyline.
After that, Perry, who played Chandler Bing on the hit show, tried to”woo” the Oscar-winning actress by sending her dozens of roses and sweet messages — including a paper on quantum physics.
“Not only did Julia agree to do the show, but she also sent me a gift: bagels — lots and lots of bagels. … I did let her in, both figuratively and literally, and a relationship began.”
However, during the same time that Perry was starring on one of the biggest TV shows and dating Hollywood’s finest, he was also battling drug and alcohol addiction.
The actor, who starred on the sitcom from 1994-2004, had to go to rehab twice during the show’s 10-year stint — including after filming the iconic moment his character married Monica Geller, played by Courteney Cox.
Perry told the New York Times on Sunday that he filmed the Season 7 finale and was then “driven back to the treatment center … in a pickup truck helmed by a sober technician.”
“[I was] at the height of my highest point in ‘Friends,’ the highest point in my career, the iconic moment on the iconic show,” he said, adding that his “exhausting” opiod addiction ruined his ability to embrace being on the NBC sitcom.
Not only did his addiction take a major toll on his career, but also his bank account.
“I’ve probably spent $9 million or something trying to get sober,” he told the outlet about his decades-long struggle that started at just 14.
At the height of his addiction, the actor was taking “55 Vicodin a day,” in addition to “Methadone, Xanax” and “a full quart of vodka.”
Due to the heavy drug use, the actor “nearly died” a few years ago when his colon burst and doctors told him he had a “2 percent” chance of survival.
Between the near-death experience and needing to wear a colostomy bag for nine months, the actor finally got sober — and has been for the last 18 months.
“My therapist said, ‘The next time you think about taking OxyContin, just think about having a colostomy bag for the rest of your life,’” he told People magazine on Thursday. “And a little window opened, and I crawled through it, and I no longer want OxyContin.”
Perry’s memoir is out on Nov. 1.
