TV AND MOVIE ROLES With series coming to end, Perry expands his career

One of the six 'Friends' stars says his addiction to painkillers is behind him.
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Matthew Perry says he had to fight back the tears when it came time to say goodbye to wisecracking Chandler Bing.
"I didn't cry, but I felt like I was about to for like seven hours," the 34-year-old "Friends" star said in an interview.
"There was a sweet moment where my girlfriend [fashion student Rachel Dunn] and I went for a walk on the stage. No one was there. We just held hands and walked around. It was sweet."
Perry -- and the rest of the cast -- knew what they were leaving behind when TV's No. 1 comedy taped its concluding episode, set to air May 6, several weeks ago.
"None of us will probably be involved in anything as successful as 'Friends' again," he said. "That's something we just have to deal with.
"We can have big successful movies, but nothing will ever be that first time again, and nothing will likely span that long a period of time. So we look back, and kind of smile, and move on."
For Perry, moving on started Friday this with "The Whole Ten Yards," the sequel to "The Whole Nine Yards," playing hapless dentist Nicholas (Oz) Oseransky, who has to recruit his former neighbor, Jimmy the Tulip (Bruce Willis), and Jimmy's wife-fellow assassin, Jill (Amanda Peet), to rescue Oz's kidnapped wife.
How he sees things
"It's tough to have a movie-star persona when you're on a show as successful as 'Friends,"' Perry says. "There was talk the first few years about a curse for us movie-wise. But I don't think any of us will crash and burn now. I think we were very fortunate. If I never work again, that's not crashing and burning -- that's called already making your mark. And, without the safety net of the show to go back to, I guess we'll all be a little more careful picking movies!"
Before "The Whole Nine Yards" in 2000, Perry's movies -- including "Fools Rush In" and "Unsung Heroes" -- were not successful.
In fact, it was while filming 2002's "Serving Sara" with Elizabeth Hurley that Perry had a relapse of his addiction to painkillers and wound up in rehab. The actor had spent time at Minnesota's Hazelden clinic in 1997 for a dependency on Vicodin.
The press reported several relapses -- along with an unrelated episode in which he crashed his Porsche into a house in the Hollywood Hills -- which he says are over now.
"For me, it was never a question of breaking the law -- it was a guy facing his private demons. So I was lucky. People seem to be behind me. ... that everyone understood helped a lot."
His varying weight over the years was also "part of the struggles I went through," he says, adding: "I'm far away from the hellish parts of all that." He still smokes but is in great shape -- though, contrary to reports, Jennifer Aniston didn't act as his personal trainer.
"No, she offered to help me dress! I'm a T-shirt and jeans guy, and Jennifer wanted to help me be a better dresser, not be my trainer. She's got better things to do!"
Career
Born in Williamstown, Mass., Perry moved to Ottawa, Canada, as a kid, then got into acting after his first career choice -- professional tennis -- didn't pan out. He got roles in TV movies (he played Desi Arnaz Jr. in the Patty Duke biopic "Call Me Anna") and failed sitcoms, then was the last actor to be cast for "Friends" in 1994, which ended up with each cast member's making $1 million per episode.
"It was a bit like, 'Do we really deserve this?' But without sounding weird, everybody made so much money off the show -- the producers, the network -- why shouldn't we be a part of it? It was as if the six of us were in a slingshot, shot into this craziness. We were thrust into public life, and we told intimate secrets about ourselves before we learned that we don't have to talk about our private life."
Since becoming famous, Perry's been linked with numerous actresses and starlets, though he says many reports were rumors.
"Yes, some I dated. But most of the girls I was linked to, I never met."
One he did date was Julia Roberts.
"That was back in '95," he says. "The funny thing about that was, when I was dating Julia, we had camera crews all around outside my house -- and when we broke up, they left and followed her!" he says with a laugh.
"I was like, 'Wait, I thought I made it.'"