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Matthew Perry had a special relationship with his stepdad, Keith Morrison. 

Perry’s mother, Suzanne Morrison, split from the Friends star’s father, John Bennett Perry, shortly after their son was born. In 1981, she married Morrison, with whom she went on to have several children. Perry, who died on Oct. 28 at age 54, wrote in his 2022 memoir that he sometimes felt like an outsider in his new blended family. But he had kind words for Morrison, whom he credited with holding the family together. Morrison was equally generous in his praise of Perry. During a 2017 appearance on Watch What Happens Live, he called his stepson “a very good guy” and revealed the impressive gift he once received from him. 

Matthew Perry gave Keith Morrison a car 

Perry was 12 when his mom married the future Dateline host. But even then, Morrison sensed that his stepson was destined for the spotlight.

“I did think he’d be famous,” Morrison told WWHL host Andy Cohen (via YouTube). “Probably not as an actor.” 

When Cohen asked if there were any perks to being Perry’s stepfather, Keith replied, “Where should I start? I mean, there are dozens of them. He is really a very good guy.”

The actor was also generous. Cohen quizzed the true crime journalist about the best gift he’d ever received from his stepson, and Morrison revealed the luxurious present he’d once received from him. 

“He gave me a car,” he said, with a smile. “He did. It was a 911.”

Morrison added that he still drove the luxury Porsche sports car. 

The ‘Dateline’ host called Matthew Perry ‘intense, talented, focused’

Morrison also opened up about his relationship with Perry in a 2020 interview with People. 

“He’s one of those people who always is the center of the room for a reason and it was so as a kid,” he said, recalling his stepson’s skill and dedication as both a hockey and a tennis player.  

“He’s an intense, talented, focused character,” Morrison added. “He’s very bright. That was always the case as he was growing up.”

Morrison also said that he wasn’t surprised when Perry landed his star-marking role as Chandler Bing on Friends. 

“Him being selected for a role like that does not surprise me one bit,” he said. “It matched his particular sense of humor precisely, whether they wrote that for him knowing what he was like or whether he adapted it more for himself, probably a combination of the two. But that character is Matthew. Yeah, and it always has been him. He’s just a talented soul, a smart guy.”

Perry wrote about his relationship with Morrison in his 2022 memoir 

Perry opened up about his relationship with this stepfather in his memoir, Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing. He called the former CTV News journalist a “lovely” person but said that his loyalty to his other could sometimes be frustrating. 

“The only thing that is annoying about Keith is that he always takes my mother’s side,” he wrote. “He is her protector. I can’t tell you how many times my mother has done something that I may have taken issue with and I’ve been told by Keith that it never happened. Some would call this gaslighting, others would call it gaslighting — it’s gaslighting. But my family was held together by one man, and that was Keith Morrison.”

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