Why Matthew Perry would say no to a 'Friends' revival
Perry, who currently stars Off-Broadway in the play he wrote, "The End of Longing," says that he'd rather "Friends" not join the revival craze of bygone sitcom hits like NBC's "Will & Grace" and ABC's "Roseanne."
"I have this recurring nightmare - I'm not kidding about this," Perry told Variety in a newly published interview. "When I'm asleep, I have this nightmare that we do 'Friends' again and nobody cares. We do a whole series, we come back, and nobody cares about it. So if anybody asks me, I'm gonna say no. The thing is we ended on such a high. We can't beat it. Why would we go and do it again?"
Perry starred as perpetually wise-cracking Chandler Bing on "Friends" from 1994 to 2004. The show was so popular that its stars negotiated the highest salary on TV at the time: $1 million per episode. Most recently, he starred on the canceled remake of "The Odd Couple" for three seasons on CBS.
The actor acknowledges that "Friends" "gave me every opportunity I ever had," but now he'd like to avoid traditional sitcom television in the next chapter of his acting career.
"In my head, I have this TV project that I'd write," Perry said. "That's what the fantasy for me is, next. Somewhere on television. But my brain just thinks of darker sh-- than what is expected on a four-camera comedy, or at least on the ones that are on TV now. What I see is serious stuff that, as a bonus, happens to be funny."