‘Still so hard to believe’: Jennifer Aniston marks 1 year anniversary of Matthew Perry’s death with poignant tribute

It has been a year since the death of the beloved actor Matthew Perry, and his Friends family is not leaving his memory to chance. Every chance they get, they’re showering Perry with so much love. 

Perry spent years bringing joy to audiences worldwide as Chandler Bing on the hit TV series Friends. On Oct. 18, 2023, Perry was found dead in his Los Angeles home, unresponsive in the hot tub. Perry struggled with alcohol and drug addiction throughout his life, a journey which he chronicled in his 2022 memoir Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing. His cause of death was ruled as a ketamine overdose, but in the year since then, more information has emerged. 

Touching tributes for Matthew Perry 

Perry’s Friends co-star, Jennifer Aniston, recently shared a touching tribute to her former co-star, commemorating a year of his death. She took to Instagram to share some touching pictures of herself and the actor over the years, including pictures of them on the set of Friends. She simply captioned the post “1 year” with a patched-up heart emoji and a dove, but the pictures say a thousand words.

Another Friends co-star, Courtney Cox, also posted a tribute to social media. In a post captioned, “Missing you today and always,” she shared a photo of herself and Perry smiling at each other, as well as a group picture of the Friends cast. Both posts were filled with comments expressing grief over his death, and support for his co-stars. 

Matthew Perry’s life and death

Perry was public about his struggles with addiction even before he released his memoir in 2022. Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing revealed that he had struggled with alcohol addiction from the age of 14 and developed a Vicodin addiction after a jet-ski accident when he was 28. While filming Friends, he struggled with his sobriety with his cast mates even trying to help him with little success. His struggles ultimately led to his untimely death last year. 

Now, on the first anniversary of his death, his family is finally speaking about it. Perry’s parents and sisters have all made public statements about his death and the journey of healing from it in the last few weeks. There have also been updates on his death, which was initially ruled as an overdose. Perry was receiving ketamine-assisted psychotherapy to deal with his anxiety, however, it was found that the ketamine dosage from his treatment did not match that in his body at his death. An investigation began in May 2024 to uncover how he obtained the lethal doses of ketamine. 

In August, five people were arrested. These are: Perry’s assistant, two of his doctors, and two drug dealers, one of which was a known drug kingpin in Los Angeles. One of the dealers was TV director, Erik Fleming who pleaded guilty and admitted to purchasing ketamine for Perry and delivering it through his assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa. Iwamasa also admitted to buying ketamine for the actor and even helping him to inject it alongside the rest of the arrested individuals. Attorney Martin Estrada who worked on the case revealed that Perry had bought $55,000 worth of ketamine from the two doctors only two months before his death. They are now awaiting trial.