Matthew Perry 'Struggled' With Sobriety Ahead of 'Friends' Reunion Special Amid Immense 'Pressure,' Says Pal : 'It's a Tough Watch'

Those close to Matthew Perry shared that the late actor was "struggling" ahead of his final TV appearance on the 2021 Friends reunion special.

In Netflix’s documentary The One About Matthew Perry, the star’s friends and family look back on what he was going through in the years before his untimely death.

"It’s a tough watch, because he’s just not himself," said Perry’s friend Kevin Pollack, adding that the actor hadn’t been in front of a camera in awhile.

Pollack said that prior to filming the HBO Max reunion special, Perry was "struggling with sobriety" and felt "a lot of pressure."

In the documentary, Perry’s sister Mia Perry Bowick also explained that "because his health was so bad, he hadn’t really been out in public since 2018."

When Perry decided to participate in the 2021 reunion – which brought him together with former costars Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc and David Schwimmer – his sister confessed he was "very nervous about coming back out."

"[He] wanted to be like, 'I’m here. I’m good, everything’s fine,'" Bowick said, even though that "was only sort of half-true."

Bowick continued that her brother’s "energy and life force" were "diminished" following his near-death experience in 2018 when his colon burst from opioid overuse.

Doctors told Bowick that Perry’s colon had ruptured in several places, causing "intense sepsis" throughout his entire body, she recalled.

The Friends star had multiple surgeries to repair his colon, and "at one point the decision was made to put him on an ECMO machine, which is basically like an iron lung."

"His fingertips were turning black. There was a possibility that he would lose his fingers," she confessed.

Bowick said it felt like a "slap in the face" to learn the cause of Perry’s health scare. At the time, she was "angry at him" and thought, "You did this to yourself, man…That was really really really hard."

Perry’s months-long hospital stay was the first time Bowick saw him and feared he wouldn’t wake up.

When The Whole Nine Yards actor came home from the hospital, "he was still in really really bad shape," Bowick recalled.

The Friends reunion was his first big public appearance following the health crisis.

"In the reunion, I think Matthew… knew he couldn’t get to the place that everybody would want him to be…I think he was really aware of that,” Jeff Strauss, a former Friends writer and producer, spilled in the documentary.

After filming it, Perry felt "relieved" and "tired," according to Bowick. "He was kind of at this place of 'How am I gonna keep going?' I know he was really scared, I know he was really fighting for his life."

Part of him "did not think it was possible to live a sober life," she added.

While she refused to give up "hope," Bowick started thinking about his addiction "as a terminal illness."

Perry died in his hot tub in his California home at 54 on October 28, 2023.

According to the autopsy report, he died from the "acute effects of ketamine" and drowning.