John Mulaney related to Matthew Perry’s struggle with addiction
John Mulaney, Matthew Perry.
Getty Images (2)John Mulaney discovered some similarities between his own substance abuse problems and those of the late Matthew Perry.
“Addiction is just a disaster. “Life is like a wobbly table at a restaurant and you pile all these things on it and it becomes wobbly and wobbly and more unstable,” Mulaney, 41, said. Variety during an interview on Monday, November 27. “Then drugs kick the king’s legs out from under the table.”
Mulaney, reflecting on the effect of Perry’s memoir, Friends, lovers and the big terrible, had told him that while he didn’t know Perry personally, he really connected with the actor’s struggles. (Perry died at his home in Los Angeles after an apparent drowning on October 28. He was 54.)
“I really identified with his story. I think about him a lot,” says the Big mouth star told the outlet.
Like Perry, Mulaney has been candid about his journey to sobriety. In September 2019, Mulaney said he started drinking at age 13 and later started using cocaine and other prescription drugs.
“I drank for attention. “I was very outgoing, but when I was 12 I wasn’t anymore,” he said Esquire at the time. “I didn’t know how to act. And then I was drinking, and I was hilarious again. I wasn’t a good athlete, so maybe it was a young man thing of, ‘This is the physical performance I can do. “Three Vicodin and a tequila and I’m still standing. Who is the athlete now?’”
At the age of 23, Mulaney decided he wanted to change his life after a “crazy” weekend.
“I went on a bender that weekend that just disappeared in and out of a movie,” he explained Esquire. “It was just crazy. I didn’t kill anyone or attack anyone. But yeah, I was like, ‘You’ve lost control.’ And I thought to myself, ‘I don’t like this guy anymore. I don’t support him. ”
After twenty years of sobriety, Mulaney relapsed and sought treatment for alcoholism and cocaine addiction in December 2020.
“I remember walking into my intervention. I had just gone to my drug dealer’s apartment and I had finally found the right balance,” the first Saturday evening live writer recalled during an April appearance on the “This past weekend with Theo Von” podcast. “One bag, all coke. One bag of all Xanax and I thought, ‘I did it. I have reached equilibrium. ”
When he returned to his home and found a “group of people” waiting for him, Mulaney insisted he “hadn’t done drugs in several days.”
In October, Mulaney said he was a “happy person” after celebrating nearly three years of sobriety following his 2020 relapse.
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“For some reason, I’ve created several obstacles in my own way, which has left me quite disoriented and quite unhappy at times,” he said during an appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. “But at my core I am a happy person. And it’s okay that I protect that by living the life I want to live. I don’t want to be the reason [my life] gets complicated.”
If you or someone you know is dealing with substance abuse, call the National Substance Abuse and Mental Health Helpline at 1-800-662-4357 for free and confidential information 24/7.