Matthew Perry’s sister Mia Perry Bowick is remembering her brother three years after his death.
Bowick, who appears in the new Netflix docuseries The One About Matthew Perry, sat down with ABC News’ Juju Chang and said that who audiences saw on television was who her brother was off screen.
“We all have those celebrities or stars that we really love, and you know, you talk with your friends and go, ‘Do you think he’s just that great in real life?’ And what I want to say to everyone was yes, he was,” Bowick said.
She added, “I think we tried the best that we could to really take care of each other in a lot of ways. So he was my person, I was his person.”
The three-part docuseries marks Bowick’s first time speaking on camera about her brother. She, along with family and friends, remembered fond memories with Perry. For Bowick, that included attending tapings of Friends when she was younger and getting to know the cast.
“They were so sweet,” Bowick recalled. “It was just, ‘Oh, Matty’s little sister is here,’ and I would go sit in the ladies’ dressing room and play with my hair. It’s just very, very little sister vibes. It was lovely and they’re such generous people. All of them are just really, really lovely.”
Bowick also shared how much the Friends cast loved Perry and described a touching moment that happened at Perry’s memorial following his death in October 2023.
“I wasn’t expecting to see them,” she said. “I was in the fog of grief. I don’t know what I was thinking. But as they came in, I was just blown over and it was so wonderful to see them and how much the cast deeply, deeply, deeply loved him.”
Perry died from acute effects of ketamine, according to an autopsy report released in December 2023 after his death. He was 54.
The autopsy listed drowning, coronary artery disease and buprenorphine effects as contributing factors not related to the immediate cause of death. The manner of death was ruled an accident.
In 2024, Kenneth Iwamasa, Perry’s live-in assistant, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine resulting in death. Iwamasa is currently serving a 3-year, 5-month sentence in federal prison.
Leading up to his death the Friends star had been open about his addiction to alcohol and prescription painkillers, which were triggered after a doctor prescribed him Vicodin following a jet ski accident. He wrote about his struggles in his memoir, Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing.
Perry also opened up about his ongoing battles in one of his last interviews with Diane Sawyer.
At his memorial, Bowick recalls a moment when she felt her brother’s presence.
“I just immediately had this sense that he’s standing behind me and just reached over and was like, ‘How effed up is this?'” she said. “Like it’s just exactly how he would say it in real life. And I was just like, ‘Yeah, Matty, this is really messed up!’ And I just started laughing so hard with tears running down my face and feeling a little funny about the fact that I’m laughing hysterically at this moment while he’s being put into the mausoleum.”
Three years after his death, Bowick says that Perry still continues to guide her.
“I would sit on my beautiful porch in Colorado and I would talk to my brother,” she said. “He would sit in the chair next to me and I say, man, this is getting really tough. And he would say things like, ‘It’s gonna be fine.'”
The One About Matthew Perry is available to stream now on Netflix.
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