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The Tragic Reason Why Friends' Chandler Changed So Much in S7

The Tragic Reason Why Friends' Chandler Changed So Much in S7
Image credit: NBC

If you watch Friends' seasons 6 and 7 back-to-back, you'll notice Matthew Perry's scary transformation in the time that passed between them. What happened with the actor?

Chandler Bing is rightfully one of the most beloved characters in Friends. Fans adore him for his dry sense of humor, witty one-liners, and ironic attitude to life as a whole — but also, because he was way more than your average clown guy, and was multi-layered enough to make his stunning friend Monica Geller fall in love with him.

The two of them had quite a long and bumpy road to being together: starting from their accidental night together at Ross's wedding in London, Chandler and Monica went through denial, hiding, then even more denial and even more hiding until they finally started dating — and the culmination of their story happened in S6's finale.

In the last episode of the season, Monica proposed to Chandler (well, she at least tried because she quickly became overwhelmed with emotions), and the two decided to get married. This was the grand finale everyone had been hoping for, and the sixth season of Friends ended right there in the living room on that positive note.

Season 7 started right where the previous one left off: in the same living room, with the same situation. However, if you watch the last S6 and the first S7 episodes back-to-back, you will notice that despite wearing the same clothes, Chandler — or, rather, Matthew Perry, — became really thin and haunted-looking in the meantime.

The Tragic Reason Why Friends' Chandler Changed So Much in S7 - image 1

The changes in the actor's appearance were straight-up terrifying, and the more attentive fans started worrying about his health…and they were right to be worried. In his memoir "Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing," Matthew explains that he was battling with his near-fatal alcohol and drug addiction at the time.

"You can track the trajectory for my addiction if you gauge my weight from season to season. When I'm carrying weight, it's alcohol; when I'm skinny, it's pills. When I have a goatee, it's lots of pills," explains the actor in his memoir.

When it comes to the way he looked in S7E1, Perry claims that despite it starting on the same night plot-wise, he lost over 50 pounds because of his addiction between the seasons. This explains his haunted look at the start of the seventh season.

Fortunately, Matthew Perry managed to finally overcome the addiction years later and has been clean since 2021. Friends: The Reunion was filmed when the actor was already off the pills, and even though you can see that it was hard on him, it was great that in the end, he won the battle with the Big Terrible Thing.

Source: Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing by Matthew Perry