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| One of the reasons Perry fits in so well as Chandler is his proximity to the character in some sense. |
Actor Matthew Perry, who rose to stardom with his portrayal of Chandler Bing in the iconic sitcom ‘Friends’, breathed his last as he died at the age of 54 at his Los Angeles home. His portrayal broke new grounds, and over the years has become a mark of the 1990s. One of the reasons Perry fits in so well as Chandler is his proximity to the character in some sense. Like Chandler, Perry’s parents too separated when he was an infant.
He grew up in Ottawa, Ontario and stayed with his Canadian mother, who was a journalist and served as press secretary to former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, the father of the current Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau. As his mother later married Canadian-born broadcast journalist Keith Morrison, Matthew also lived briefly in Toronto and Montreal. At the age of 15, Perry moved from Ottawa to Los Angeles to live with his biological father, John Bennett Perry - an American actor and former model. Perry pursued acting in Los Angeles as he lived with his father. He also pursued improvisational comedy while still in high school.
After his graduation, he was selected to play Chazz Russell in the TV series ‘Second Chance’. The show ran for 13 episodes, after which it became ‘Boys Will Be Boys’. The new plots were now focused on the adventures of Chazz and his friends. This was followed by Perry’s big screen debut in the 1988 film ‘A Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon’. The following year, he had a three-episode arc on the series ‘Growing Pains’, where he portrayed Carol Seaver's boyfriend Sandy who dies in hospital after a drunk-driving crash.