Salma Hayek really got under Matthew Perry’s skin: “Her ideas weren’t always helpful”
In the 1990s, few people were more famous than the cast of Friends, with the Central Perk gang being household names, watched by millions and millions of people every week.
This was an era where ‘TV famous’ and ‘movie famous’ meant very different things. The six main cast members attempted to break into Hollywood with mixed results, and while Jennifer Aniston was easily the most successful, there was every chance that Matthew Perry could have eclipsed her.
The man behind Chanandler Bong starred in a few Hollywood hits while Friends was still on the air, alongside Bruce Willis in both The Whole Nine Yards, which topped the box office, and The Kid, a cult-favourite Disney flick.
Younger fans might remember Perry as the older version of Zac Efron’s character in 17 Again. He also missed out on one of the biggest movies of the 1990s when he shockingly turned down a role in Independence Day, so who knows what effect this would have had on his career.
One of his earliest attempts to break into feature film was 1997’s Fools Rush In, where he starred alongside Salma Hayek as a couple who decide to get married after a one-night stand. The pair’s cultural differences lead to some complications, with hilarious results, or, at least, that was the plan, but the movie was a critical flop.
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, looking back at this part of his career, Perry revealed that his co-star wasn’t always the easiest person to work with, claiming that Hayek would often give “very lengthy and elaborate idea[s]” regarding her character. One of her schemes involved the two spooning in Perry’s trailer in between shoots, so they would feel more like a real couple. In his own words, “her long-winded ideas weren’t always helpful”.
He continued by describing one moment in particular that Hayek tried to ‘improve’ with her suggestions, recalling, “There’s one scene in which I’m professing my love for her. She suggested that we don’t look at each other; rather, we should look out at our future together. After listening to this nonsense for about twenty minutes, I finally said, ‘Listen, Salma’, I said, ‘I’m telling you I love you in this scene. You look wherever you want, but I’m going to be looking at you’.”
Interestingly, this dynamic actually reflects the two characters in the movie, where Perry plays Alex, a straight-laced architect who does everything by the book, while Hayek plays Isabel, a carefree photographer who lives life by her own rules, thus this conflict is the driving force of the movie, especially when the two get married (somebody give that casting director a raise).
Despite clashing with his co-star, the actor spoke very fondly about his time on Fools Rush In, clearly understanding that Hayek was just trying her best to make the movie as good as possible, and given what some actors have done in pursuit of perfection, suggesting a little cuddle is remarkably tame.
