Chris Pérez will love his late wife’s family por siempre.
Three decades after the death of Selena Quintanilla-Pérez, her widower reflected on the unique bond he shares with her family. In fact, his relationship with her sister Suzette Quintanilla led to them partnering on the upcoming documentary Selena y Los Dinos: A Family’s Legacy.
“Things like this project bring us together,” Chris told E! News in an exclusive joint interview with Suzette. “Even when things are good or everything is just flowing, to be able to work on a project like this together, even though you're close, it just brings you closer.”
And their partnership on a documentary like Selena y Los Dinos—out on Netflix Nov. 17—works because, as he said, “I'm in the room with somebody like Suzette that understands me in a way that nobody else does, and that's a special bond.”
Indeed, Chris and Selena’s family have a complicated history together. After the musician joined Selena’s band Selena y Los Dinos—of which Suzette was also a member—in 1988, he began a romance with the “Bidi Bidi Bom Bom” singer. But when the couple eventually eloped in 1992, her dad and manager Abraham Quintanilla famously disapproved, briefly kicking him out of the group.
And though the patriarch eventually became supportive of his future son-in-law, the pair underwent another public fallout years later, when they entered a legal battle over a TV series Chris wanted to make about Selena’s life. (The suit was settled in 2021.)
Despite their disputes though, Suzette agreed that Chris and the family have “always been close.”
“Like everything, family has disagreements about certain things, but we're past that,” she shared. “I will always consider Chris family, and I know that he feels the same way about me, and that's it.”
Suzette added, “At the end of the day, we're family. We have each other's back.”
Plus, Suzette and Chris aren’t just bonded as “forever” family members. As she said, they will “forever be business partners” working to protect Selena’s legacy, too.
Describing their efforts to preserve his late wife’s “icon” status and “what she represents,” Chris added, “It's not anything that we take lightly [and] we get a lot closer when working on things like this.”
Stream Selena y Los Dinos on Netflix Nov. 17, and read on to look back at Selena’s life in photos.