Mourning Chandler

The one where we say goodbye to a Friend.

Friends was a lifeline for me when I was younger.

My dad bought me every season on DVD so I could watch it while I recovered from my ballet injury. I would binge it along with Criminal Minds. The former gave me a reason to laugh every day and the latter gave me an idea for a career that never came to fruition.

My favorite character on Friends was always Chandler.

A sweet, sarcastic, goofball — often overlooked and unlucky in love until Monica. An arc in the show that I don’t think anyone really saw coming but everyone loved.

I don’t know a lot about the person behind the character. I’ve never been someone to be starstruck or interested in celebrity gossip. I did notice the changes in him throughout the seasons though. Weight loss, weight gain, weight loss again. When I watched the Friends Reunion on HBO Max and learned why his speech was so different — I bought and read his memoir. I was sad to learn of his struggle with drugs and alcohol.

I had an addiction to opiates that I was prescribed so I could relate to the issue of having to overcome such a horrendous hurdle.

It’s a strange thing to mourn a character but that’s how I feel right now. While I’m fully aware that Matthew Perry is a real person and those who knew him personally are mourning the loss of that real person — millions of people around the world today are waking up to a world where they picture Monica and the twins alone.

When a beloved television show ends, you like to think of the character’s lives continuing beyond the final credits. They moved to their new house and raised their kids. Maybe they got a pet or two.

I don’t even know how old the twins would be now since I watched the show after it was already over but now, they’ve lost their father.

A world without Chandler Bing.

Or Miss. Chanandler Bong if you know the show really well.

I probably watched the entire series at least ten times over but the trivia game episode was always my favorite. No one ever really knew what Chandler did as a job until he switched to advertising but we do know he wasn’t a “transponster” because that's not even a word!

I know Matthew Perry was a real person who existed before Chandler and continued to be himself after the series ended. But to me — he was always Chandler. My favorite character on my favorite show.

It was a stroke of brilliance to title the episodes with the beginning “the one with…” as that is how people talk about shows after they’ve aired.

Did you see the one with the giant poking device? I love that one but did you see the one with the Holiday Armadillo?

Those are actual episode titles — but it is how people discuss television shows that they like and the producers of the show went with it.

Today, waking up to a world without Chandler feels like The One Where We Say Goodbye.

Being an actor in such a popular and syndicated show means in a sense, you get to live forever. Your face and voice will always be present in someone’s home, somewhere in the world. But it also means that when you die — far too young — people are sad about the character.

I hate that I’m one of those people.

He was a real person. But I was really not one to follow the lives of celebrities. I read his book. It made him real to me for a while. But I didn’t like associating Chandler with the pain and life trials of Matthew Perry and somehow my brain separated the two. Just not enough that I can see it as one continues while the other is gone.

Chandler could continue to live on. I could sit here and continue to imagine that world. Joey visiting and staying in his dedicated room at the house Chandler and Monica bought. Ross and Rachel taking vacations with them along with the twins, and Ben and Emma. Pheobe writing ridiculous songs about them and eventually having her own kids with Mike. The group always returning to Central Perk to have coffee before Monica and Chandler returned to their house outside of the city (since they both still worked there).

Friends in and of itself asked the audience to suspend all belief and reality of Manhattan. I grew up there and can tell you unequivocally that there is no way that any of them could have afforded the apartments that they lived in — even with rent control and pretending to be the aunt who was supposed to live there.

But maybe it was because of my life in Manhattan that I loved the lack of New York realism so much. It was nice to imagine such a tight-knit group of friends living so well in such a difficult city to survive within.

I quote the show so regularly that it’s simply become a part of my speech pattern. And most of the time, I’m quoting Chandler. He was the laughter of the show. It was a comedy, yes, and all of the characters had their moments — but every episode guaranteed a good laugh from Chandler. There were times that I laughed so hard that I missed things and had to rewind an episode — sometimes more than once.

Watching it the way that I did — with the entire series on DVD — I was able to see the outtakes and the specials and all of the extras. And the group of actors really were friends. I don’t think any of them went on to have a career as large as Jennifer Aniston but they all continued to act when the show ended.

I saw Matthew Perry in a few movies but in my mind, he remained, and remains to this day — Chandler Bing.

Do the fans mourn and say goodbye or do we suspend reality and pay respect to the man behind the character but allow Chandler to live on?

I can only answer that for myself.

Roll credits and fade to black.

RIP Matthew Perry/Chandler Bing.

Thank you for the laughter.