Dear maintainers,

I have noticed that perl-mode modifies in a non-standard way the
font-lock-variable-name-face.  This makes it impossible to get perl
buffers to look like other programming modes, in accordance with user or
theme configurations.

The attached patch merely assigns font-lock-variable-name-face while
removing the hardcoded underline property.

If you think that the underline should remain in place, then I can
provide another patch that would add a new face which would inherit from
font-lock-variable-name-face and add an underline accordingly.

All the best,
Protesilaos

-- 
Protesilaos Stavrou
protesilaos.com