Matthew Perry was ‘angry and mean’ due to drug use in final days

Matthew Perry was “angry and mean” due to the cocktail of drugs he was using in his final days, a friend has claimed.

Actor Matthew Perry. Picture: Frederick M. Brown/Getty I

Matthew Perry’s autopsy report revealed a grimmer look at the star’s final days.

The report, obtained by Page Six on Friday, revealed that a female friend of the actor said he was “angry and mean” in the weeks before his death because he had been taking testosterone shots.

The eye-opening report noted that aside from a lethal amount of ketamine mixed with the opioid-like drug buprenorphine, which is used to alleviate pain and help with addiction to opioids, Perry had been taking Tammoxifen to lose weight, antidiabetic medication and nicotine lollipops.

Before his death, he was trying to quit smoking. His live-in assistant said he had been smoking about two packs of cigarettes per day.

New details of Perry’s death have been publicly released in recent days. Picture: Frederick M. Brown/Getty

The medical examiner’s report further exemplified how heavily Perry relied on prescribed and over-the-counter medication to maintain his quality of life.

“In the assistant’s bedroom, there were multiple open, empty, half-filled medication bottles prescribed to the decadent, as well as over-the-counter medications, vitamins, digestive aids and dishes filled with multiple various loose pills, tablets, caplets, candy and breath mints,” the report read.

In Perry’s bathroom, there were “prescribed ointments, digestive aids and oral rinses.”

The “Friends” star had been receiving ketamine infusions regularly before his death, but the report noted that the ketamine found in his body came from elsewhere.

His last infusion occurred a week and a half before he died, and its half-life is only three to four hours.

“It is more likely this was recreational ketamine use,” Dr. Bankole Johnson, one of the top neuroscientists and physicians in the world, told Page Six exclusively.

Perry posted this photo from his hot tub days before he died. Picture: Instagram

Matthew Perry and stepdad Keith Morrison. Picture: Keith Morrison

“It would be questionable medicine to provide ketamine to someone also using buprenorphine — a true recipe for disaster.”

Perry had previously written about his dislike of ketamine in his 2022 memoir Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing: A Memoir, saying he often felt like he was “dying” during the treatments he received while staying at a Swiss rehab during the pandemic.

“Taking K is like being hit in the head with a giant happy shovel. But the hangover was rough and outweighed the shovel,” he penned.

“Ketamine was not for me.”

In fact, Perry was supposed to be off his infusions before he died, as his anaesthesiologist Dr. Ataoin (whose name was partially redacted in the autopsy report)‚ said he no longer needed the treatments because “his depression was fine.”

Furthermore, the unnamed female to whom the medical examiner spoke said the beloved actor was even in “good spirits” during their final conversation that took place days before his death.

This corroborates Jennifer Aniston’s story, who said she spoke to Perry the morning of October 28, hours before his assistant found him facedown in the pool of his $US4 million Hollywood mansion.

“He had quit smoking. He was getting in shape. He was happy — that’s all I know,” she told Variety following his death.

“I was literally texting with him that morning, funny Matty.”

“He was not in pain. He wasn’t struggling. He was happy.”

Perry, who revealed in 2022 he spent about $US9 million trying to stay sober throughout his life, wanted to be remembered not as Chandler Bing, his iconic “Friends” character, but as someone who helped guide people through their addictions.

“The best thing about me, bar none, is that if somebody comes to me and says, ‘I can’t stop drinking, can you help me?’ I can say ‘yes’ and follow up and do it,” he proudly stated on the “Q with Tom Power” podcast in 2022.

He founded the Perry House in 2013 to help people stay sober and had plans to launch a foundation before his passing.

The Matthew Perry Foundation was launched in his honour days after he died.

This story originally appeared on Page Six and is republished here with permission.

Originally published as Matthew Perry was ‘angry and mean’ due to drug use in final days