The Matthew Perry story we keep telling is missing the most important pages

October 28th marks three years since Matthew Perry passed away. As the anniversary of his death fast approaches, Netflix has released its trailer for a documentary set to cover the life and death of the actor. While watching the trailer for the upcoming doc, I couldn’t help but wonder whether we are actually remembering Perry or just re-packaging the same heartbreaking story because that’s what audiences find most compelling.

In the three years since Matthew Perry passed away, the media has presented us with the same tragic story again and again. The story goes as follows: Perry rose to fame as the lovable and wise-cracking Chandler Bing in Friends. The second act of his story becomes his battle with addiction, $7 million on rehab, and all the other difficulties he faced along the way. Finally, his story ends with his death at his Los Angeles home in 2023. 

Perry’s sister, Mia Perry Bowick, and Perry’s best friend of more than 40 years, Roger Castillo, are seen in the trailer for the documentary, titled The One About Matthew Perry, talking about the actor’s battle with addiction and the lasting legacy he left. The documentary is directed by Emmy Award winner Mary Robertson. None of Perry’s Friends co-stars took part.

While we don’t know everything the Netflix documentary will cover, the trailers suggest it will tell that story once again, this time perhaps with the added context from the actor’s friends and family. 

There was so much more to Matthew Perry

While this story is true, it’s missing huge parts of the actor’s life which are worth talking about and even celebrating. Perry had spoken in depth about the struggles and pain his addiction had caused him, but he also spent years talking about how he wanted to use those terrible experiences to help and offer kindness to others.

A huge part of the actor’s later life was spent helping others. According to Friends co-creator Marta Kauffman (via the BBC), helping other addicts gave him a “purpose,” so much so that he reportedly turned his $10 million Malibu beach compound into a men’s sober living facility in 2012. The following year, the project received an award from the White House.

All this is to say that Matthew Perry brought a lot of good into the world, but it might not fit into such a neatly packaged story. Perry didn’t hide his pain or his struggles; instead, he wanted to use his story to accomplish greater things. The documentary runs the risk of sanitizing his story or presenting it as a feel-good story centering on his recovery.

While his death was, and still is, incredibly sad, focusing on the same aspects- the rise and fall- seems to only satiate the audience’s want for a tragic tale, but Matthew Perry’s kindness and unwavering support for addicts is the part of the story everyone seems to forget.