Abuse of Power

Image credit: Friends: Danny Feld

ADDICTED TO LOVE Perry (at l., with Cox Arquette) returned to rehab, delaying the filming of ''Friends''' sweeps wedding episode

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Aaron Sorkin

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Matthew Perry, 31, meanwhile, recently faced another type of trial: After a second stab at rehab (he spent a month in 1997 at Hazelden in Minnesota for Vicodin addiction), he returned to the set of ''Friends'' to tape the sitcom's season finale. (His May 2000 car accident had nothing to do with drugs, according to police.)

There is an obvious pattern in all this -- but maybe a not so obvious one as well. The news here, after all, isn't that celebs sometimes develop drug and alcohol problems. Andy Dick (who crashed his car two years ago, in an admitted substance related accident), Kelsey Grammer (who, while under the influence in 1996, flipped the Viper that NBC had given him), Melanie Griffith, Tim Allen, Brett Butler, Kurt Cobain, Courtney Love, Scott Weiland, John Belushi, Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe, practically the entire Barrymore gene pool at one time or another -- there's no shortage of drug and alcohol abuse drama in Hollywood.

Nor is it any longer possible to make the case that the entertainment industry actively encourages drug use among its stars; the days when Louis B. Mayer was supposedly shaking bottles of pills down Judy Garland's throat are a thing of the past.

What is news, or at least what's starting to get noticed, is how some stars just can't seem to get it together no matter how hard Hollywood tries to help. In recent years, recovery has practically become L.A.'s second biggest industry (and maybe its biggest social scene, with celeb AA meetings turning into A list events). On set drug counseling is offered on some lots (like David E. Kelley's) -- probably because former substance abusers are now being hired by the bushel (''The West Wing'' alone has two outspoken recovering alcoholics in its cast: John Spencer and Rob Lowe).

And yet, despite all those efforts -- the 12 step programs, the 28 day treatment centers, the endless interventions, and countless second chances -- despite it all, this town is still murder on stars trying to go straight.

Additional reporting by Rob Brunner, Tricia Johnson, Lynette Rice, Jessica Shaw, Dan Snierson, and Allison Hope Weiner

See EW's May 4, 2001, issue for the rest of this controversial cover story (on newsstands April 27).