‘Magical summer’ : When Gwyneth Paltrow kissed Matthew Perry in a field of long grass, swam in creeks

Actress Gwyneth Paltrow has reflected on her old friend Matthew Perry as his former co-stars and fans reckon with the news of his death at the age of 54.

Just before Perry found 'Friends' fame, he met Paltrow at Massachusetts' Williamstown Theater Festival in 1993, and now the actress remembers him as "so funny and so sweet and so much fun to be with", reports People magazine.

Sharing a headshot of a young Perry with her Instagram followers, Paltrow wrote in her caption that she met Perry at the Williamstown Theater Festival in Massachusetts, where the two young actors spent "most of the summer doing plays."

"We drove out to swim in creeks, had beers in the local college bar, kissed in a field of long grass. It was a magical summer."

As per People, Paltrow added that, while Perry shot the 'Friends' pilot around the time that to know one another, the show "had not aired yet," and Perry was "nervous, hoping his big break was just around the corner."

"It was," she wrote. "We stayed friends for a while until we drifted apart, but I was always happy to see him when I did. I am super sad today, as so many of us are."

Perry wrote about his fling with Paltrow in his 2022 memoir 'Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing', where he noted that the pair shared a brief "make-out session in a closet" before 'Friends' aired.