In Netflix's new docuseries, Mia Perry Bowick says the cast walked in together, then walked up to the casket holding hands and stood around it.
In The One About Matthew Perry, a three-part Netflix docuseries that premiered on Tuesday, Matthew Perry's younger sister, Mia Perry Bowick, recalls seeing the Friends cast at his funeral. The Friends star died in October 2023, at age 54.
The funeral took place six days after he died, at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Los Angeles. Mia said she sat in the front row with the family. "The funeral was very small, close friends and family only," she said.
Aniston, Cox, Kudrow, LeBlanc and Schwimmer were present at the funeral service. "And then the rest of the Friends cast all walked in together," Mia recalled. "I hadn’t seen them in easily 20 years," she said, and Aniston was the first to reach her. "Jen Aniston was the first one of them to come up to me and give me a huge hug."
Mia described the moment at the casket:
"And then all five of them walked up to the casket holding hands, and just stood around him, crying."
In a joint statement after his death, signed by Aniston, Cox, Kudrow, LeBlanc and Schwimmer, they said: "We were more than just cast mates. We are a family."
Later, the cause of his death was ruled to be the acute effects of ketamine. His live-in assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine resulting in death, and was sentenced in May to three years and five months in prison.
Mia said there had been overdoses and car accidents. "We’ve had a lot of near misses," she notes. Mia said that in 2018, opiates slowed his digestive tract so much that he was hospitalized in the ICU for a ruptured colon, and that he spent three months in hospital. "He aged 20 years in three months," Mia added.
Mia said the family had liked and trusted Iwamasa, and were happy when he began working with Perry after the 2018 medical crisis. Mia said they "really, really trusted him."
Mia said Perry seemed very nervous before the 2021 Friends reunion, and that afterwards he felt relieved, really tired and really scared.
Director Mary Robertson told the Los Angeles Times the series is "a love letter that's full of the moments when Matthew stumbled." None of his Friends castmates sat for an interview for the series, Variety's review notes.
All three episodes are now streaming on Netflix.
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