On Saturday evening (local time), Matthew Perry was found lifeless in the hot tub of his Los Angeles home. The “Friends” star was only 54 years old. At this point, the cause of death is still completely unclear and the results of the autopsy are not yet known.
Just a day earlier, Perry met presenter and actress Athenna Crosby for lunch. Pictures of the meeting were published by the celebrity portal “TMZ,” among others. Perry and Crosby seem to have an animated conversation. The 25-year-old has now spoken out on her Instagram account – and cleared up some rumors.
“I didn’t really want to talk about it, but yeah, that’s us both last Friday,” she says. She emphasized that she did not want to gain attention or even fame with her statements. “I am so devastated by his death but felt it would be in poor taste to talk about it publicly because the attention should not be on me, but on him and his legacy. He was a very private person and I have always respected that in our friendship ” said Crosby.
However, it was important for her to mention that Perry was in a good mood when they met. “He was in really good spirits. He talked about all the things he had going on. He was happy and lively,” said the actress. She called speculation about his death “conspiracy theories” that should be avoided.
With this, Crosby alludes to Perry’s alcohol and drug past. For most of his life, Perry battled addiction, which he spoke about in detail in his autobiography, “Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing.” Most recently, Perry was clean and on a mission: He wanted to help those affected with his own story, went to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings and is even said to have been a sponsor (a kind of mentor) for other addicts.
“When I die, I don’t want ‘Friends’ to be the first thing mentioned,” he said on the “Q with Tom Power” podcast a year before his death. Something else is much more important to him. “I want to be remembered as someone who lived well, loved well and was a seeker. (…) And whose most important concern is that he wanted to help people.”
The best thing about him, Perry said, is that he can respond to a request for help from an addict. “I want it to be the first thing mentioned and I will spend the rest of my life proving that,” he said just a year ago.
Sources: “TMZ” / Instagram
