From Matthew Perry to Kit Harington: How stars can spend over $120,000 on rehab and recovery

Dubai: "He spent $7 million trying to get sober."

That is how Mia Perry Bowick describes her late brother, Friends star Matthew Perry, in the trailer for Netflix's new docuseries The One About Matthew Perry. The figure works out at roughly Dh25.7 million.

The three-part series premieres on Netflix on October 27, a day before the third anniversary of Perry's death at 54. The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner ruled that he died from the acute effects of ketamine.

Perry spoke openly about his addiction for years. He is also one of several public figures whose addiction, and the treatment that followed, came with a large bill. Some of that money went on long stays at private clinics. Some went on the substances themselves.

Here is what some well-known names have spent, based on their own accounts and published reports.

Matthew Perry: 15 stays in rehab over three decades

In his 2022 memoir, Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing, Perry wrote that he had spent $7 million on 15 stays at rehab facilities.

Weeks before the book came out, he revised that number upwards. "I've probably spent $9 million or something trying to get sober," Perry told The New York Times. That is about Dh33 million.

The memoir also records around 6,000 AA meetings and 65 stays in detox, according to Variety. Perry said he had undergone 14 surgeries linked to his addiction.

His first stay in rehab was in 1997. He returned in 2001, 2003 and 2011, and later opened a sober living facility, Perry House.

When the spending is on substances

Treatment is only one part of the cost. For some, spending on drugs themselves ran into millions.

Steven Tyler's 2011 memoir put the Aerosmith frontman's spending on cocaine during the 1970s and 1980s at about $20 million. Asked about that figure on Australia's 60 Minutes, he said the real number was lower, but not by much.

"Probably, realistically, 5 or 6 (million), easy," Tyler said. That is roughly Dh18.4 million to Dh22 million. By his own count, he has been to rehab eight times.

Reality star June Shannon, known as Mama June, described a similar pattern on a smaller scale. In her first broadcast interview after entering rehab, she told Andy Cohen that she and her partner spent $600,000 (about Dh2.2 million) on cocaine in six months.

She estimated the yearly total at more than $1 million, with daily spending of $3,500 to $4,000 (about Dh12,850 to Dh14,700). By then she had been sober for several months and was working in the recovery community with her partner, Geno Doak.

Private clinics at $120,000 a month

Game of Thrones actor Kit Harington spent time at Privé-Swiss, a boutique mental health and wellness facility in Connecticut, in 2019.

Page Six reported that he was there for stress, exhaustion and alcohol use, at an estimated cost of more than $120,000 a month. That is about Dh440,700. He reportedly checked in weeks before the show's finale aired in May that year.

The facility's website says it takes only three clients at a time, with one-to-one services and private accommodation. His representative described the stay in simpler terms: "Kit has decided to utilize this break in his schedule as an opportunity to spend some time at a wellness retreat to work on some personal issues."

High prices at private centres are not new. In a 2008 interview with NPR, Chris Prentiss, founder of the Passages treatment centre in Malibu, put the cost of a one-month stay at $67,550 (about Dh248,100).

Britney Spears: a programme she says she did not choose

Britney Spears's case is different. It concerned mental health treatment rather than addiction, and she has said she was sent there against her will under her conservatorship.

In her June 2021 statement to a Los Angeles court, Spears said she was placed in a mental health facility costing $60,000 a month (about Dh220,350) after cancelling her planned Las Vegas shows in early 2019. She recalled her father telling her she would pay that amount for a programme in Beverly Hills.

She told the court she had to hand over her credit cards, cash, phone and passport during the stay. Details of her mental health have never been made public. The conservatorship ended in November 2021.

The costs that continue after treatment

Leaving a facility does not always mean the spending stops.

Many people in recovery hire sober companions, who stay with them as they return to daily life. According to The Hollywood Reporter, these counsellors can cost as much as $1,500 a day, or about Dh5,500.

Demi Lovato and Nick Nolte are among those who have used them, the publication reported, often for weeks or even months at a time. Their job goes beyond keeping clients away from alcohol and drugs. They help them stick to new routines and keep an eye on who is around them.

Lindsay Lohan: When the bill becomes a strain

Not every star found the cost easy to carry.

During Lindsay Lohan's court-ordered stay at the Betty Ford Center in 2010, her probation officer's report said she could not afford to keep paying for the programme and needed to work. She told the officer that "continued inpatient treatment would be a hardship financially, and damaging to her career."

At the time, a representative for Betty Ford said inpatient care for young adults cost $27,500 for 30 days and $63,000 for 120 days. That is about Dh101,000 and Dh231,400 respectively.

Where to watch

The One About Matthew Perry streams on Netflix from October 27. The series features his sister, lifelong friends and people Perry met in recovery, along with unreleased photos and videos from the family's private archive.