Actor Matthew Perry speaks onstage in the course of the sixty fourth Annual Primetime Emmy Awards at Nokia Theatre … [+]
Excerpts from Matthew Perry’s upcoming memoir, through which Perry will get candid together with his struggles with habit, have been inspiring headlines for a number of weeks. One passage, which took a random, mean-spirited jab at Keanu Reeves, sparked backlash on-line, prompting an apology from Perry.
Within the passage, Perry discusses his shut friendship with the late River Phoenix, and his response to Phoenix’s dying in 1993 from an overdose.
“River was an exquisite man, inside and outside — too stunning for this world, it turned out,” Perry wrote within the ebook. “It at all times appears to be the actually gifted guys who go down. Why is it that the unique thinkers like River Phoenix and Heath Ledger die, however Keanu Reeves nonetheless walks amongst us?”
It’s an odd, tasteless jab that appears to return out of nowhere, and Perry repeats the sentiment in a later passage the place he describes his response to the dying of Chris Farley, who additionally died from an overdose.
Perry writes. “I punched a gap via Jennifer Aniston’s dressing room wall once I came upon. Keanu Reeves walks amongst us. I needed to promote ‘Nearly Heroes’ two weeks after he died; I discovered myself publicly discussing his dying from medicine and alcohol. I used to be excessive your entire time.”
There aren’t many “unproblematic” celebrities on the market these days, and Reeves is without doubt one of the few who stays nearly universally beloved, particularly on-line. So many celebrities have been outed as abusers, or grow to be consumed by bigotry, whereas Reeves has a status of being a genuinely pretty particular person.
Therefore, the web immediately got here to his protection.
Some speculated that Perry is likely to be nursing some form of private grudge towards Reeves, whereas others famous that the jab was significantly merciless, contemplating that Reeves has skilled greater than his justifiable share of grief and loss.
In response to the flood of condemnation, Perry rapidly apologized, and tried to make clear his intentions. In a assertion to Folks Journal, Perry stated:
“I’m truly a giant fan of Keanu. I simply selected a random title, my mistake. I apologize. I ought to have used my very own title as a substitute.”
Some commentators have been confused by Perry’s apology, as Reeves didn’t appear to be a random title in any respect; like Perry, Reeves was as soon as shut pals with River Phoenix.
In earlier interviews, Reeves has been candid about how a lot he nonetheless grieves the late actor. In an interview with Esquire, Reeves mentioned Phoenix, stating:
“It’s bizarre talking about him up to now. I hate talking about him up to now. So I nearly at all times gotta preserve it current. He was a extremely particular particular person, so unique, distinctive, sensible, gifted, fiercely artistic. Considerate. Courageous. And humorous. And darkish. And lightweight. It was nice to have identified him.”
Maybe Perry, who rose to fame within the nineties, the place “edgy” humor was rather more standard, was merely making a foul joke that basically didn’t land; tastes have modified, as audiences have grow to be extra empathetic.
These days, that form of mean-spirited humor has grow to be strongly related to right-wing provocateurs, or fading comedians clinging on to relevancy via controversy.
No matter Perry was considering, he absolutely discovered his lesson – by no means goal Keanu Reeves, essentially the most beloved man on the web.
