Matthew Perry Reveals How He Created Chandler’s Era-Defining Manner Of Speech In ‘Friends’

deadline.com:

Matthew Perry has revealed how he created the unique speech patterns that made his character Chandler Bing so distinctive from the moment he appeared in Friends.

Perry has written a memoir about his rollercoaster ride with global sitcom success, addiction and rehab – extracts of which have already brought headlines, including his crush on co-star Jennifer Aniston and near-death experience with opioids.

Switching to his craft in an extract published in today’s Times, Perry explains how, right from his audition, he was inspired to give Chandler a speech pattern that stood out, with its emphasis on unusual words and syllables.

He writes:  “I read the words in an unexpected fashion, hitting emphases that no one else had hit. I was back in Ottawa with my childhood friends the Murrays; I got laughs where no one else had.” Becoming the final member of the lead cast of six, Perry took this same style of delivery into production: “I was talking in a way that no one had talked in sitcoms before, hitting odd emphases, picking a word in a sentence you might not imagine was the beat.  “I didn’t know it yet, but my way of speaking would filter into the culture across the next few decades.