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Matthew Perry died last weekend from an apparent drowning, and less than a week after his passing, his legacy is already being firmly established.
A charity called the Matthew Perry Foundation has just been created in his memory, and according to its mission statement, their goal is simple: to help people struggling with addiction, something Perry always worked hard to do.
“The Matthew Perry Foundation is the realization of Matthew’s enduring commitment to helping others struggling with the disease of addiction,” the mission statement reads. “It will honor his legacy and be guided by his own words and experiences and driven by his passion for making a difference in as many lives as possible.”
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The Matthew Perry Foundation has been established to help people struggling with addiction. (Mike Pont/WireImage)
The charity’s website is sparse right now, with only the mission statement and a form to donate, but it also includes a photo of Perry and a memorable quote he made during an appearance on the “Q with Tom Power” podcast last year.
“When I die, I don’t want ‘Friends’ to be the first thing that’s mentioned – I want helping others to be the first thing that’s mentioned,” he said then. “And I’m going to live the rest of my life proving that.”
The site also includes a quote from Perry’s memoir, “Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing” that read “Addiction is far too powerful for anyone to defeat alone. But together, one day at a time, we can beat it down.”
Matthew Perry struggled with addiction for much of his life. (Ron Galella, Ltd./Ron Galella Collection)
People reports that Perry was working on setting up the foundation before his death.
He had previously turned a former home he owned in Malibu into a sober living facility called Perry’s House. It operated for two years before closing in 2015.
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“That was a Malibu beach house, and it was too expensive to run, and the business didn’t really work,” Perry told The Hollywood Reporter in 2015. He ran the facility along with addiction specialist Earl Hightower.
People close to Matthew Perry have said that he was sober when he died. (Mike Pont/WireImage/Getty Images)
He also helped friends who were struggling. After the news of his death broke, actor Hank Azaria spoke out abut the loss of his longtime friend, saying on Instagram, “I’m a sober guy for 17 years. I want to say that the night I went into AA, Matthew brought me in. The whole first year I was sober, we went to meetings together. As a sober person, he was so caring and giving and wise and he totally helped me get sober. I really wish he could have found it in himself to stay with the sober life more consistently.”
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Perry’s personal battle with addiction began early on in his life – as he wrote in his memoir, “Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing,” he began drinking when he was 14.
Matthew Perry was found dead in a hot tub in his Pacific Palisades home on Saturday. He was 54. (David M. Benett/Getty Images)
When filming 1997’s “Fools Rush In,” he got into a jet ski accident, and a doctor on set gave him a Vicodin for his back pain. He became addicted to prescription painkillers as well.
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The actor was found dead at his Los Angeles home on Saturday. He had apparently drowned, although no cause of death has been announced. An autopsy has been completed, but the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner’s office declined to list a cause, instead waiting for the toxicology reports.
Matthew Perry wanted people to remember for him for his work helping addicts. (Gregg DeGuire)
Athenna Crosby, Perry’s friend who was photographed with him the day before he died, told Fox News Digital, “He was 100% sober when he passed. I mean, I can’t know what exactly he was thinking or feeling. I can only share my experience. And, of course, he was his own person that maybe he had said, done or thought of things the day that he passed that I might never come to know.”
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“In the interaction that I had with him, he was extremely positive, sober, acting normal, spoke very well, did not give me any impression that he was under drugs or alcohol of any kind. So, I think people are speculating that this was a relapse situation. I just want to defend him and say that it was not.”
