Friends’ Matthew Perry reportedly wanted Zac Efron to play his younger self in a biopic.
Athenna Crosby, an entertainment TV host who says she met Perry through a “mutual friend,” had lunch with the actor the day before he died (October 28).
The couple were photographed during their lunch, and the photos quickly went viral, prompting Crosby to come out about their meeting and how Perry allegedly discussed ideas for a movie of his life.
Crosby spoke with Entertainment Tonight about the ‘upcoming projects’ Perry allegedly informed her he wants to work on.
“He was very optimistic about the future,” she adds, “and we were talking about how there’s been a public resurgence of interest in him recently and how he was hoping to use that to have a second act in his career.”
“And he was doing extremely, extremely well.”
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Crosby claims that Perry discussed his ambition to film a biopic about his life with him over lunch.
“He said he wanted to make a movie about his life.” she said.
“And he had worked with Zac Efron in the past on a movie and he said that he wanted Zac Efron to play him as a younger version in an upcoming biopic about him and that he was going to ask him soon to do that.”
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Efron and Perry collaborated on the 2009 film 17 Again, with Efron playing the younger Mike O’Donnell and Perry playing the elder version of the same.
Crosby added that she was ‘totally in shock’ and ‘devastated’ when she learned of Perry’s death. And that she had only spoken out about the pair’s lunch because of the online’speculation’ that followed the release of images of them.
Crosby says Perry ultimately wanted to make a biopic on his life so he could “share more about his story” and “recovery from addiction.”
“He was so looking forward to […] really championing that cause to help more people,” she said.
“He really wanted to use his fame and notoriety to provide a platform for other people struggling with addiction recovery,” Crosby resolves.
“He wanted to use his celebrity to highlight other people’s stories of addiction and recovery, as well as to donate a large portion of his personal funds to people to assist them on their journey.”
“Of course, there might be plans that he had, that are unbeknownst to me, that maybe he shared with others, or maybe he kept to himself.”
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