Jennifer Aniston finally spoke out on the tragic passing of her real-life friend—and Friends costar—Matthew Perry. She posted a heartbreaking message on Instagram along with a touching black-and-white photo of the two of them laughing together on the set of Friends.
The public has been waiting for Jennifer’s statement since Matthew passed away on October 28. Jennifer did not hold back. “Oh boy… this one has cut deep,” she wrote.
Jennifer Opened Up About Her Grief
“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.” she added.
“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.”
She also recalled how much Matthew cared about making people laugh: “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.”
Matthew Would Text Jennifer Out of Nowhere
In the second slide of her Instagram post, Jennifer shared a screenshot of a text message that Matthew “sent her out of nowhere one day.” The screenshot shows Matthew sending Jennifer the same photo featured in her Instagram post. “Making you laugh just made my day, It made my day,” he wrote. “Awwww… the first of thousands of times,” responded Jennifer.
The two co-stars remained close even after Friends stopped filming. In a 2022 interview with Diane Sawyer, Matthew opened up about their friendship and said Jennifer supported him through the ups and downs of his struggles with addiction and sobriety journey. “She was the one that reached out the most. You know, I’m really grateful to her for that,” he said. He also revealed that Jennifer was the one who confronted him about his addiction while filming Friends and said “we know you’re drinking.”
Being close to Matthew while he was struggling is perhaps why Jennifer ended her Instagram tribute by mentioning that she knows he is now at peace. “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,” she concluded.
