Emmys 2024: The Sad Reason The Friends Cast Didn't Host The Matthew Perry Tribute

Matthew Perry’s tribute at the 2024 Emmys almost looked a lot different — but the wound left behind by his death is just too “fresh.”

If you tuned into the awards ceremony on Monday night, you were probably moved by the touching in memoriam segment. Charlie Puth and The War and Treaty performing a beautiful rendition of See You Again, which transitioned into the Friends theme song. The moment concluded with Matthew’s picture on screen, earning an emotional applause from the audience to the tune of a surprisingly elegiac version of I’ll Be There For You.

The moment was pretty perfect, but could have been made even more heartfelt if the rest of the sitcom’s cast, like Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt Leblanc, and David Schwimmer were up there on stage. But for Matthew’s friends, it’s just “too soon.”

Emmys executive producer Jeannae Rouzan-Clay told The Hollywood Reporter on Tuesday that Matty’s death is “still very fresh for them.”

That makes sense… It’s just been three months since the tragedy.

Fellow executive producer Jesse Collins added that including them in the segment was, indeed, an idea “early on,” but that they wanted to respect the cast’s grieving process:

“I can imagine, from their side, they’re mourning someone who was still very close to them. I can’t speak for them, but we all have to respect that they were their own family. It was probably just a little too soon.”

Totally. And beyond that, producers didn’t want to make the segment too Matthew focused… as there’s a lot of other respected icons that also sadly passed away:

“Yes, Norman Lear and Matthew Perry, you have to give some special attention to, but you don’t want anyone to feel slighted. Everybody’s contribution was significant, and this is their moment inside this package.”

While it would have been great to see Rachel, Monica, Phoebe, Joey, and Ross all paying tribute to Chandler, we think the segment was perfect in its final version.

Charlie Puth performs the theme song from #Friends during the in memoriam segment at the 75th #Emmys pic.twitter.com/YbfNUZOHYj

— The Hollywood Reporter (@THR) January 16, 2024