Ozzy Osbourne had a special bond with Matthew Perry before both of their deaths.
In his posthumous memoir, “Last Rites,” released Tuesday, the late rocker revealed that he encountered Perry when the “Friends” star was dealing with his addiction struggles.
“He used to come to our house for AA meetings, or so my wife [Sharon Osbourne] tells me,” Ozzy wrote in his book, calling Perry “the funniest, most talented bloke,” per Us Weekly.
“And he was trying so hard to stay on the right path,” the Prince of Darkness added.
Perry battled addiction for decades before he died of a ketamine overdose at age 54 in Oct. 2023.
“Then one day he listened to his addiction telling him it was OK to get loaded, and that was it — game over,” wrote Ozzy, who died in July at age 76. “I felt so sad when they said he’d been found in his hot tub, unresponsive, with ketamine in his system.”
“He’d given everything he had to stay clean,” Ozzy added of Perry. “But it wasn’t enough.”
In his 2022 memoir, “Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing,” Perry wrote that he attended about 6,000 Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, went to rehab 15 times and estimated that he spent around $9 million trying to get sober.
The “17 Again” actor claimed that he was sober when he was promoting his memoir.
“Everything starts with sobriety. Because if you don’t have sobriety, you’re going to lose everything that you put in front of it, so my sobriety is right up there,” he told People one year before his death.
Five people were arrested in relation to Perry’s death, including his longtime assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, who has been accused of administering the ketamine shots that allegedly killed Perry.
Ozzy, for his part, experienced his own addiction struggles that he wrote about in his book.
The rocker claimed 2012 was the year he “fell off the wagon” after his wife, Sharon Osbourne, “busted” him and sold the cars he bought during his bender, which led Ozzy to attend 90 AA meetings in 90 days, according to US Weekly.
“It helped me, all that AA stuff,” Ozzy recalled. “Got me started on the way back to being sober. If you’re on your own, the voice in your head is too persuasive.”
Ozzy also revealed he once tried “a microdose” of ketamine and after realizing he “could have some serious fun with this,” but never had the drug again.
“For the first time in years, I was able to be really honest with myself,” the Grammy Award winner wrote. “When I walked out of that ketamine clinic, I told myself I’d never let addiction steal my spirit from me again.”
“Last Rites” is out now.
