Just one day after news of Matthew Perry’s tragic death, one of his oldest friends, Hank Azaria, is speaking out.
Azaria, 59, took to Instagram on Sunday and revealed that Perry, 54, was “the first boyfriend I made in Los Angeles.”
“When I moved there, I was 21 and he was 16. We did a pilot together called Morning Maggie that never saw the light of day, but Matthew and I became really good friends,” Azaria added.
“We were more like brothers for a long time.” We drank a lot together. We laughed a lot together. “We were there for each other in the early days of our careers,” Azaria added.
“He was as funny to me as he was on Friends and other things, but personally he was just the funniest man ever,” Azaria recalled.
Opening: Just a day after news of Matthew Perry’s tragic death, one of his oldest friends, Hank Azaria, opens up
First boyfriend: Azaria, 59, took to Instagram on Sunday and revealed that Perry, 54, was “the first boyfriend I made in Los Angeles.”
“He lived to laugh, and every night he was… he was like a genius.” “He started weaving comedy threads together just by hanging out,” Azaria added.
“A joke here, a joke there, a joke here, a joke there, and at the end of the night he put them all together in a crescendo of hilarity,” Azaria explained.
He added: “Most nights you spent with Matthew you ended up crying and laughing. “I really loved him. “Many of us who are close to him really thought we lost him to drugs and alcohol a long time ago,” Azaria explained.
“As he documents in his book and his autobiography, there was so much suffering.” “I had to pick up and put down that biography about 11 times, it was so painful for me to read,” Azaria admitted.
“It was really… as his friend who loved him, I knew he was suffering, but the details were just devastating,” Azaria admitted.
He added that he has been sober for 17 years and that “Matthew walked me in the night I went to AA.”
“The first year I was sober, we both went to meetings together and he was so great… I could tell him this: As a sober person, he was so caring, generous and wise and he totally helped me get sober,” added Azaria added.
“And I really wish he had found it in himself to be more consistent in being sober, but as a recovering guy, it was hard to interpret that too,” Azaria admitted.
Genie: “He lived to laugh, and every night he was… he was like a genius.” “He started weaving comedy threads together just by hanging out,” Azaria added
Most nights: He added: “Most nights you spent with Matthew, you ended up crying and laughing. “I really loved him. “Many of us who are close to him really thought we lost him to drugs and alcohol a long time ago,” Azaria explained
David: Azaria played the role of David, Phoebe’s (Lisa Kudrow) love interest on Perry’s groundbreaking hit series Friends
“I just felt so bad. I knew he had been going back and forth for years, he documented it all publicly and then in a book, but it is heartbreaking for those of us who loved him and knew him really well personally. “We just missed him,” Azaria said.
“The terrible thing about this disease is that it just takes away the person you love, and he was, you know, so brilliant professionally and as an actor,” Azaria said.
“I just wish I and the world could have gotten what the rest of his career would have been,” Azaria concluded.
Azaria played the role of David, Phoebe’s (Lisa Kudrow) love interest on Perry’s groundbreaking hit series Friends.