In the wake of the shocking death of Friends star Matthew Perry, his co-stars have taken to social media to speak about their dear friend. Courtney Cox, Matt LeBlanc, and Jennifer Aniston have shared on Instagram photos of themselves and Perry, some favorite outtakes from Friends, all wrapped up with captions ridden with love, remembrance, and some humor to lighten the mood.
On Tuesday, November 14, Matt Leblanc was the first to pay tribute on social media. He shared some photos of him and Perry as their characters Joey and Chandler in their classic goofy hijinks and he also shared a photo of the entire cast all huddled together behind the scenes. LeBlanc’s caption praised Perry for his humor and their friendship and was wrapped up with a light joke that is very Chandler Bing.
The caption reads, “Matthew It is with a heavy heart I say goodbye. The times we had together are honestly among the favorite times of my life. It was an honor to share the stage with you and to call you my friend. I will always smile when I think of you and I’ll never forget you. Never. Spread your wings and fly brother you’re finally free. Much love. And I guess you’re keeping the 20 bucks you owe me.”
Following that, Cox took to social media to share her tribute to her TV husband. But instead of photos, she shared a video of an outtake from the series. She wrote in an Instagram post, “I am so grateful for every moment I had with you Matty and I miss you every day. When you work with someone as closely as I did with Matthew, there are thousands of moments I wish I could share. For now, here’s one of my favorites,”
The scene that the outtake was from was the season four finale when Chandler and Monica are seen in bed together for the first time. You can watch it below.
She continues, “To give a little backstory, Chandler and Monica were supposed to have a one night fling in London. But because of the audience’s reaction, it became the beginning of their love story. In this scene, before we started rolling, he whispered a funny line for me to say. He often did things like that. He was funny and he was kind.”
Wednesday, November 15, Aniston also posted about her late co-star. She shared photo of Perry making her laugh and a screenshot of him sending said photo to her talking about how important it was to him that he made her laugh. The text read “Making you laugh just made my day. It made my day:))” with Aniston’s response being “Awww the first of THOUSANDS of smiles.”
The photos were followed by the caption that reads: “Oh boy this one has cut deep… Having to say goodbye to our Matty has been an insane wave of emotions that I’ve never experienced before. We all experience loss at some point in our lives. Loss of life or loss of love. Being able to really SIT in this grief allows you to feel the moments of joy and gratitude for having loved someone that deep. And we loved him deeply. He was such a part of our DNA. We were always the 6 of us. This was a chosen family that forever changed the course of who we were and what our path was going to be. For Matty, he KNEW he loved to make people laugh. As he said himself, if he didn’t hear the ‘laugh’ he thought he was going to die. His life literally depended on it. And boy did he succeed in doing just that. He made all of us laugh. And laugh hard. In the last couple weeks, I’ve been pouring over our texts to one another. Laughing and crying then laughing again. I’ll keep them forever and ever. I found one text that he sent me out of nowhere one day. It says it all. (See the second slide…) Matty, I love you so much and I know you are now completely at peace and out of any pain. I talk to you every day… sometimes I can almost hear you saying “could you BE any crazier?” Rest little brother. You always made my day…”
This is the first any of the members of the Friends cast have publicly spoken about Perry’s death other than a joint statement that read: “We are all so utterly devastated by the loss of Matthew,” the quintet’s statement began. “We were more than just cast mates. We are a family. 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. For now, our thoughts and our love are with Matty’s family, his friends, and everyone who loved him around the world.”
Perry passed away on October 28 in his home where his assistant found him unresponsive in his hot tub. The official cause of death has yet to be confirmed.