Matthew Perry passed away at his home on Saturday. TMZ reportedly paid off a police source to break the news before Perry’s family was informed of his passing. Hellish. Perry’s family came to the scene quickly and the family made some heartbreaking statements. It felt like everyone was waiting for Perry’s Friends costars to speak out, and they waited until they all agreed on a joint statement. They kept it simple. I’m sure they’re all devastated.
The Friends cast is mourning one of their own. Two days after Matthew Perry’s sudden death, his fellow castmates from the hit television series — Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc and David Schwimmer — spoke out in a joint statement, exclusively obtained by PEOPLE.
“We are all so utterly devastated by the loss of Matthew. We were more than just cast mates. We are a family,” their statement reads. “There is so much to say, but right now we’re going to take a moment to grieve and process this unfathomable loss.”
“In time we will say more, as and when we are able,” the statement continues. “For now, our thoughts and our love are with Matty’s family, his friends, and everyone who loved him around the world.”
The message is then signed by Aniston, Cox, Kudrow, LeBlanc and Schwimmer.
Series co-creators Marta Kauffman and David Crane were joined by executive producer Kevin Bright in issuing a joint statement on Sunday.
“We are shocked and deeply, deeply saddened by our beloved friend Matthew’s passing,” they wrote. “It still seems impossible. All we can say is that we feel blessed to have had him as part of our lives. He was a brilliant talent.” Reflecting on Perry’s breakout performance, they noted, “It’s a cliche to say that an actor makes a role their own, but in Matthew’s case, there are no truer words. From the day we first heard him embody the role of Chandler Bing, there was no one else for us.”
Kaufman, Crane and Bright’s statement continued, “We will always cherish the joy, the light, the blinding intelligence he brought to every moment — not just to his work, but in life as well. He was always the funniest person in the room. More than that, he was the sweetest, with a giving and selfless heart. We send all of our love to his family and friends. This truly is The One Where Our Hearts Are Broken.”
Calling him “Matty” broke my heart a little bit – that was his nickname with the Friends cast. I hope they’re all talking and supporting each other at this time. While I knew Perry was well-liked within Hollywood, I’ve been surprised by just how many celebrities have been mourning him as a longtime friend. Salma Hayek also posted a statement (they worked together on Fools Rush In) and Gwyneth Paltrow revealed in her statement that they hooked up in their 20s.
Gwyneth Paltrow saying a truly sweet and poignant goodbye to Matthew perry and slipping in the fact that they hooked up is EXACTLY how I want to be remembered pic.twitter.com/Udif0dQ1EA
— Lizzie Logan (@lizzzzzielogan) October 30, 2023
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images, Backgrid, Instagram.
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- THE CAST OF FRIENDS ARRIVING TO THE HISTORIC LIVE TELECAST OF NBC’S 75TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION. STUDIO 8H AT ROCKEFELLER PLAZA IN NEW YORK. 05 MAY 2002,Image: 548463638, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: WORLD RIGHTS – Fee Payable Upon Reproduction – For queries contact Photoshot – sales@photoshot.com London: +44 (0) 20 7421 6000 Florida: +1 239 689 1883 Berlin: +49 (0) 30 76 212 251, Model Release: no, Credit line: Dennis Van Tine / Avalon
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- New York, NY – Matthew Perry signs autographs as he leaves his hotel this afternoon in Tribeca. Pictured: Matthew Perry BACKGRID USA 1 NOVEMBER 2022 BYLINE MUST READ: BlayzenPhotos / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Celebrities At ‘The Late Show With Stephen Colbert’ Featuring: Matthew Perry Where: New York, New York, United States When: 01 Nov 2022 Credit: ROGER WONG/INSTARimages.com/Cover Images
And with this Weve lost The First of our Friends. This happened way sooner that I ever hoped it would.
He was also the one I recognized most when the show first aired. I was like who’s the cute, funny guy who has been on these other sitcoms that have not made it. He was definitely talented and his life struggles made him get what is important ab life over fame/money. I was very taken by his honesty in his memoir. I encourage others to read it. I was rooting for him and still root for him wherever he is now in the universe. And God he was funny, what timing.
That is exactly what I thought when I first heard – we have lost the first of the Friends. The fact that they called him Matty is so sweet and familiar. He was more than a coworker and friend. He was family to them.
And then I my thoughts went to the remaining five and how devastating this must be for them because I know that they were still close. I heard that he was especially close with Jennifer Anniston and Matt LeBlanc.
Matthew Perry was so great at physical comedy. Especially his facial expressions.
I loved the scene where he’s telling Rachel that he doesn’t dance at weddings because weddings are a great place to meet women “and when I dance I look like this” and then he does that wonderful, awful and awkward dancing motion with his arms.
The Matty name made me sad too, as I’ve heard Matt refer to Jen as Jenny before. I can’t imagine how devastated they are. I’m personally much more upset about it than I expected to be, but it really feels like hearing about an old friend who died. 🙁
I am much more upset it than I thought I would be too. This is the first celebrity death in a while that feels very personal to me.
Yes, it feels very personal. Friends started when I was a sophomore in high school, and it carried me all through my high school, college, and young adult years. I hardly knew anyone who didn’t watch it. I was talking to someone about this yesterday–that sometimes I forget how many fewer options of things to watch there used to be. Before streaming services came along, what was on tv was what you got, and I think that’s something that younger people will never fully comprehend. Audiences had fewer options, therefore most of us were watching the same things and discussing them and analyzing them. I remember vividly moments like when Ross said Rachel’s name instead of Emily’s and when Chandler and Monica slept together. Friends was literally part of the zeitgeist of the 90’s and of my personal younger years, and it’s most definitely hitting me hard.
Personal is a good way to describe it.
I was just starting college when the show started, I feel like it was with me through college and the beginning of adulthood beyond.
I’m glad they issued a joint statement, it’s the best way to do it. They must all be so devastated, they really bonded over that crazy experience and loved each other.
@Lucy – I was a junior in college and had just moved into my first apartment when the show began. I feel the same way you do about it. I remember the finale so clearly as marking those ten years of my life.
I am glad the cast made a joint statement, which reinforces everything we’ve felt about their union over the years.
The series finale of Friends as the same night as my last exams senior year of college. We all sat around and drank champagne and cried.
@L84Tea I think you raise a good point about the limited options 20 years ago for TV (and I mean, there was still cable and stuff, LOL.) We watched Friends, ER, Sex and the City, Sopranos. because there were only so many options, and streaming wasn’t a thing, it felt like people were roughly watching the same dozen, two dozen shows.
(I feel like I’m making it sound like 2004 was the 1954 when we only had three channels, but hopefully people here get it, lol 🤣)
Someone described Game of Thrones as the last great water cooler show and I kind of agree with that. Even with the EXCELLENT series available on streaming, because not everyone has the same services or not everyone watches the night an episode drops (or the whole season), it doesnt create the same buzz on a Monday morning of “did you see X last night?!!?!?”
I think that ended up helping to create a bond between the viewers and the show and its actors – I think we saw that with Sophie Turner last month when social media blew up in defense of Sansa Stark.
I know I sound so old when I say this LOL but it really does feel different now.
And I think that bond is why so many Friends fans are hurting, because we felt like Chandler was one of OUR friends.
@Becks1; I completely understand what you mean. I was a child of the 90s (high school/college) and we got invested in tv shows in a way that just doesn’t happen with streaming today. The show would air once a week and then you had to patiently/frustratingly wait for the next episode to air the following week. For shows like Friends, ER, Beverly Hills 90210, we would have viewing parties every week. Get together in someone’s dorm room or apartment and watch the episodes together and talk about it afterward. I feel like that made us closer to the characters and actors in a way I don’t feel about shows on streaming. Friends was such a huge part of my youth and when I see old episodes now I’m transported back into the carefree time of my college years. Maybe that’s why I feel like Matthew Perry’s death feels like losing an actual friend of mine. May he rest easy.
This is also hitting so much harder than I expected. I know Friends had such a huge revival in recent years (and as a BTS fan, I appreciate it for teaching RM English! Lol), but I never got back into it this go-round.
But I’d forgotten how formative it was in my own life. Friends started when I was in high school (but I was watching “My So-Called Life” that year instead so missed the first season), and it was on through college – something my freshman year roommate and I could actually agree on watching! – and a little beyond for me.
I taught English at my old high school the year after I graduated from college, and it was so exhausting that I just went to work, graded & prepped for the next day’s until dinner, then ate dinner watching nightly reruns of Friends and then immediately went to bed exhausted, that entire year. I joked that my only friends were the Friends friends, since I had no time or energy to see real friends that year.
And a few years later, when the series finale aired I watched in a hospital ICU waiting room, waiting for my turn to visit my dad, who’d just had an aortic dissection. I remember crying during the finale, surprised at how much I would miss the Friends crew. A few days later, my dad died and I don’t think I’ve watched Friends again since.
Kristin we did the same, all gathered in someone’s dorm to watch the shows, and everyone watched and we’d all talk about them. I got one of those small TV/VCR combos that lasted me through college, LOL.
I did a semester abroad during college, and my parents taped a bunch of shows, including Friends, for me to catch up on when I got back. Different times.
MP of all of them seems to have touched a chord with so many people, even days later people are on twitter (refuse to call it the other name) talking about what an impact his personal struggles and his portrayal of Chandler had on them
I was surprised and pretty underwhelmed by the friends’ post — I don’t think it met the moment. If that had been the statement in the first few hours, yes. But Kaufman and Crane’s, and Paltrow’s seem more fitting to me. Maybe it’s because it was 5 of them and they couldn’t agree. IDK, but it seemed lacking. You put something out 24 hrs later it ought to be a piece of art or at least something that centers on him not you and your loss. “As and when we are able?” Pffft.
With all due respect, you shouldn’t judge grief. Paltrow probably hasn’t seen him in decades. His costars were his family. I couldn’t speak about my ex boyfriend’s death for months after he died, and he HATED me. I’m sure they will release another statement once the shock has worn off a bit.
Just like many people I was waiting for their statement. It’s probably morbid curiosity. I don’t really understand what you expected, though. They owe us nothing. They lost a friend who was actually like family. They don’t need to perform anything for us. Even if it’s been a few days. So what? People EXPECTED them to say something so they did. But I wouldn’t want to be put in a position where I HAVE to say something publicly after losing a loved one and living up to people’s very subjective expectations.
That’s really judgy
They just all lost a good friend and basically said they are too upset at his death to elaborate. It’s like sticking a mic in the face of someone who just lost a loved one. In the moment what exactly would you demand the 5 of them say, together, to meet your standards?
The cast of friends don’t owe us shit. His family don’t owe us shit. Let them be in their grief
It’s very weird to me the way people expect performative grief from celebrities. They did it with Angus Clouds costars earlier this summer, and I remember them doing it with Naya Rivera and the Glee cast too. Like if people that actually knew them don’t wail and rend their clothes in public they weren’t actually good friends or they don’t really miss them? It’s bizarre because we don’t actually know these people, they do. It’s gross to expect them to perform for us at a time like this. We shouldn’t try to judge whether people who are all strangers to us are being sufficiently supportive it’s not our place.
I beg to differ.
I think you wanted a PR statement.
But we got an honest one.
They are hurting, they don’t have words to say how much.
To me it felt united, heartfelt, and brief – I’m assuming they were under pressure to make a statement, everyone has been weirdly clamoring for it, and this was simple and got the job done.
It’s a weird thing that we expect celebrities to make statements like this in the height of their shock and grief. Maybe we should just let people be.
People, even actors don’t have to perform their grief to your satisfaction. Seriously, this is a gross attitude to have.
Eh, if I was in their position I wouldn’t WANT to have to say anything at all. They put that out because they knew the public wanted to hear from them, which is more than they had to do.
They do not owe us anything. They are grieving.
I’m sure they are just absolutely gobsmacked with this news.
If I’d lost one of my closest colleagues and friends, after decades of friendship, it would take me a very long time to come up with anything close to a worthy tribute, because there would just be so much to say, yet so much grief clouding everything.
They are probably still right now in a fog of grief too thick to penetrate or process anything much.
Your comment is super wild to me. This is their real friend and they had to find out of his passing through TMZ.
The fact that you think their statement is underwhelming is crazy thing to say out loud or over the internet.
Ah, the internet’s version of the local judgy gossips. They look through the obits every Sunday. ‘They spelled Bertha’s last name wrong!’ ‘Sandy had 5 grandkids, not 4’ ‘Now why did Matty’s family not write a more heartfelt statement?’ ‘What is the world coming to!’
MP was the best part of every show and movie he was in. He seemed like a sensitive soul. His death is profoundly sad and sadly, not completely shocking. Hopefully the good things he did to help other addicts will be his legacy.
You said this perfectly. I could not agree more
I don’t know if he said it in his book or promoting his book that if he died people would find it shocking but not surprising. Everyone knows that excessive drug and alcohol use takes its toll on the body. It’s still very sad.
If this story is about the entire Friends cast then why use a photo without Lisa Kudrow? Is she not part of Friends? Too lazy to use the right picture.
It is not a story about the entire friends cast, it is a story about the cast releasing a statement in the wake of his death, and that picture is one of the few more recent ones of him that isn’t a gross pap pic.
Getting on here to call people lazy while everyone is mourning is just a cruel way to use your voice.
Lisa Kudrow was a signatory to the statement. The photo should have included her.
Of all the celebrity deaths lately, Matthew Perry was the one that shocked me. I’m genuinely sad he’s gone. Chandler shaped so many of us, and it seemed like MP was finally getting past his demons. I was in a store last night and saw a coffee mug- Chandler & Monica & Joey & Ross & Rachael & Phoebe, and it took a lot for me to put it back on the shelf.
JFC I didn’t know that TMZ leaked it before the family was told. It’s not at all surprising, but still so, so shitty.
There are very few celebrities who, it seems, absolutely no one has anything bad to say about, but Matthew appears to be one of them. Everyone he worked with, dated, etc. seems to have stayed friendly with him. It’s still so upsetting that he’s gone.
Like others I am surprised by how hard this hit me. I found out about it the night it happened and I’m still feeling so sad over his loss. And I can’t even say I grew up with the show. I was in my late 20s and had a child already when it first aired. Still, “Friends” was so huge and was with us for a decade.
I looked at it as a kind of alternative universe for my personal life, one I might have inhabited if I hadn’t gotten married and moved away from NYC. Though let’s face it, I wouldn’t have had an apartment as nice as Monica’s, wouldn’t have had as much time to sit around the coffee shop with all my friends and definitely wouldn’t have been as funny.
It seems like the Friends cast members really were not ready to talk about it, but felt like they had to say something. So they did and that is enough for me. Let them grieve in their own ways and their own time(s).
Matthew was much loved as shown by the loving tributes from family, friends and everybody who knew him as a kind and sensitive soul.
His premature death is heartbreaking and yet TMZ saw fit to shove cameras in the shocked faces of his elderly parents and step dad as they arrived at his home. Shame on them!
This one really hurts. I, too, was in high school/college when Friends was on. One of my and my husband’s only possessions when we first moved in together was the complete DVD set. I’m surprised at how strongly I feel, and after reading Matthew’s memoir last year, I think he would be surprised at how the world feels too. When I read that the church bells in Bruges played the theme song to Friends the morning after his death, I cried, thinking that this man never knew how loved he really was. Rest in Peace Matty. 🤍
The church bells playing the friends theme song is a beautiful tribute. Matthew’s death has touched me more than any celebrity I can remember. Friends was the theme song to my generation. So sad but he will live on in our memories.
I hope his family and close friends get the privacy and time they need to grieve. It’s so hard when someone dies suddenly. He was only 1 yr older than me! He will miss so much.
RIP Matthew Perry, you left behind a wonderful legacy.
Where was Lisa in that main photo? Why didnt you include her?
I feel so bad for all of them, this must be such an incredibly shocking and upsetting loss for the whole cast. They were all part of such an intense and once in a lifetime phenomenon, only the 6 of them can understand what it’s like. To lose one of their own so early, I can’t fathom what that must be like. I wasn’t a Friends fanatic (I was in middle school when the finale aired) but I remember it being on TV on Thursday nights and my mom being all excited to watch. I had a feeling they would issue a joint statement. I hope they can all lean on each other during this difficult time.
The officer that leaked the info needs to be fired now.
I didn’t watch Friends. Even though I am GenX. I remember some of the classic moments from the show.
Matt was a major teenage crush for me. I will always remember his Sandy from Growing Pains. I loved his movies. Whole Nine Yards is a true classic.
I am still processing that he is gone. He was so sweet and kind, even during his struggles.