Tom Selleck remembers Matthew Perry as a 'raw talent' while working with him on Friends

Tom Selleck might have had onscreen rivalry with Matthew Perry on Friends, but it was nothing but love between the costars in real life.

The Magnum P.I. star, 79, looked back at his time on the hit sitcom as ophthalmologist Richard Burke, an older gentleman who strikes up a romantic relationship with a younger Monica (Courteney Cox). Perry's beloved Chandler and Matt LeBlanc's Joey develop a bond with the cigar-smoking, mustachioed eye doctor during the earlier episodes. (A brief Monica/Richard/Chandler love triangle emerged in a later season.)

Selleck remembered the late Perry's talent while filming an episode during season 2 — namely, one where Chandler and Joey were trying to be more like Richard while Richard was trying to be more like his younger pals. "We had this role reversal thing going," Selleck recently recalled to USA TODAY, sharing that he had trouble mastering one signature Chandler line.

"Could that shot be any prettier?" was the line he had to deliver about his foosball skills, and Selleck said he frequently conferred with Perry about it. "Matthew had this speech pattern that I hadn't been aware of," Selleck said. "Matt told me, 'It's a joke, Tom.' It's the way he says it. But during that whole show, I kept going up to him asking, 'Can you say it again?' and he'd do the line. That was his signature."

Selleck also shared that his friendship with Perry's father, actor John Bennett Perry, helped break the ice with the cast. "Everybody couldn't have been nicer to me," Selleck said. "But every day I'd see Matthew, and I'd ask him, 'How's your father?' And he'd always smile and we'd catch up. I got to know his father when I was a young struggling actor. Almost any commercial or pilot I went out on, there was John. We became real good friends."

The actor added of Perry, "He was raw talent. Matthew's gone, so it's easy to say this, but it's true. I think he was the most talented of a very talented group of people."

Perry died unexpectedly in October from acute effects of ketamine and drowning. He was 54. Selleck had been invited to the private memorial service in Los Angeles alongside the sitcom stars, including Jennifer Aniston, Lisa Kudrow, and David Schwimmer, but was unable to attend due to his shooting schedule in New York for Blue Bloods, which is set to conclude after its upcoming 14th season.

He marveled at the cast's friendship. "There are no bad stories," Selleck said. "They all just got along. I think it's because all these actors had failures on other shows. And now they're in this hit. They all realized how lucky they were."

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