Since premiering nearly two and a half decades ago, Friends has shown itself to be a long-lasting cultural phenomenon.
In the 1990s and early 2000s, over the course of its ten-year run, each episode of the series routinely drew in anywhere between 20 million to 50 million viewers, with the series finale alone attracting over 52.5 million viewers at the time of airing.
Nowadays, in this day and age of delayed viewing and streaming, it’s hard to even conceive of so many people sitting down across the country to watch an episode of television in real time that way.
In recent years, the series continues to gain new fans thanks to streaming on Netflix in its entirety, as well as circulating in reruns for hours on channels such as Nick @ Nite, TBS, and more. It’s constantly used in reaction GIF form on Twitter and Facebook, and frequently appears in top ten lists all across the internet.
Something about Friends, therefore, has staying power in a way that a lot of television shows really don’t.
Perhaps some of that can be attributed to the fact that the struggles of twenty-somethings trying to make their way in the world are, in some ways, evergreen content: there will always be struggling adults looking for advice and comfort in the form of entertainment.
However, a large part of that can be attributed to the fact that Friends did what matters most in a sitcom series: they did a really good job at casting the right people for the right roles– well, most of the time, at least.
With that said, here are the 11 Casting Decisions That Hurt Friends (And 11 That Saved It).
Hurt: Christina Applegate (Amy Green)
It’s never an enviable position for an actor to find themselves in when they’re hired for an episode or two, late in a series, to guest star as a previously unheard-of family member.
Odds are that the character will be grating, a source of conflict, and totally unnecessary for the overall plot of the main character’s life.
Friends did this on multiple occasions, but by far the worst executed one found viewers introduced to Rachel’s clueless, even more privileged sister, Amy.
Christina Applegate has proven herself to be a strong comedic actress, but something about this role never worked for her skill set.
Whether it was the way in which she practically screeched each of Amy’s already tone-deaf lines, or the way in which the character was written to be so totally overbearing, it’s clear that Applegate was miscast in the role, and that further, the role should never have been introduced to begin with.
Saved: James Michael Tyler (Gunther)
Sometimes, supporting characters can become just as important to the overall feel and look of a series as the main characters themselves.
While Gunther never really had any substantial plots of his own – apart from his series long unrequited love of Rachel, that is – he was always there, a reliable source of snark and judgment at the gang’s regular hangout Central Perk.
Without James Michael Tyler in the role, there’s no telling what kind of presence Gunther would have been, or whether he would have been as prominently featured at all.
However, thanks to Tyler’s signature peroxide blonde hair, his ability to effortlessly deliver the most brutal of sarcastic comments, and his air of being put upon without putting others off, Gunther has become one of the most iconic Friends characters.
His presence is as significant as that of Central Perk itself.
Hurt: Aisha Tyler (Charlie Wheeler)
It isn’t just the role of a family member introduced late in a series that can prove to be a thankless job for an actor.
The odds are that last-minute love interests will never really pan out into anything significant – and moreover, will likely only serve as a roadblock before the main characters can find their way back to the characters they are meant to be with.
Charlie never works from the moment she enters the series. Whether as Ross’s girlfriend or Joey’s girlfriend, Charlie is aloof and often cold.
This is due in large part to Aisha Tyler’s apparent inability to portray a character who doesn’t seem like she has a real chip on her shoulder, which is surprising, given her comedic talents elsewhere.
Charlie never clicks with the cast as a whole, and so, it comes as no surprise that she is suddenly written out in the end.
Saved: Maggie Wheeler (Janice Litman Goralnik)
Janice may not be the most interesting character out of the hundreds and hundreds of characters that Friends created in its ten-year run, but she has perhaps the desirable (or not) distinction of being the easiest – and loudest – to remember, due to the caricature-like nature of the character.
Whether in her extended bouts of nasal laughter, her tendency toward shrieking “Oh. My. God!,” or her inability to get over Chandler, Janice had the making of a larger than life character from the very beginning.
Thanks to Maggie Wheeler’s hilariously over the top performance, Janice remains one of the characters that immediately comes to mind when people talk about Friends – perhaps, in some ways, more than the six friends themselves.
Hurt: Jane Sibbett (Carol Willick)
As progressive as Friends may have been for including lesbian characters in central roles in its earliest seasons, there’s no denying that its portrayal of these characters was still steeped in decades of misogyny and homophobia.
Carol was never once portrayed in a sympathetic light, by the narrative itself or by Ross’s recollections of her.
She was made to seem shrill and high maintenance, even more so when her wife was present.
Perhaps a more skilled comedic actress could have worked with this and made something genuinely enjoyable out of the poor presentation.
However, Jane Sibbett just wasn’t as comically adept as she could have been to make that a possibility.
Instead, Carol’s scenes often feel downright melodramatic, and totally out of place within the series.
Saved: David Schwimmer (Ross Geller)
Oh, Ross— where do we start with you?
While he may not be everyone’s cup of tea, there’s no denying that Ross Geller was one of the most important characters in the entire Friends group, as much of its central narrative revolved around his life choices, more than some of the other friends’.
His back and forth relationship with Rachel defined a decade of television, and has fans hotly contesting whether they were, in fact, on a break all these years later.
Although occasionally annoying and overbearing, Ross was, at heart, a good guy, nerdy and awkward and unsure of himself.
Thanks to David Schwimmer’s comedic skills, Ross was able to come across as so many different things during his development – a bad husband, a good father, a great friend, and a confused brother and son.
Ross grew a lot over the series, but that growth was only made possible due to Schwimmer’s performance.
Hurt: Hank Azaria (David)
To be fair, there’s really nothing inherently wrong with the idea of David as a character. He’s one of the great loves of Phoebe’s life, quirky and witty and bashful and loud in equal measure, and perfectly rivaling Phoebe in her weirdness in so very many ways.
Some of their moments are genuinely touching, leading to some of Phoebe’s biggest episodes of growth and change.
However, the problem with David lies in one simple thing: the casting of his character.
Hank Azaria is a wonderful comedic talent, a gifted voice actor, and a truly versatile actor, but his portrayal of David, unfortunately, comes across as alternately creepy and desperate – neither of which our Phoebe remotely deserves.
Saved: Jennifer Aniston (Rachel Green)
You could argue that Rachel has some of the biggest development across the series – from spoiled and hopeless to successful and self-sufficient, with a family and friends all her own.
She may not have always been the funniest member of the group, or necessarily the most likable at that, but Rachel was always interesting, always surprising, and always fiercely independent.
The strength of her character can be attributed in large part to Jennifer Aniston’s portrayal.
Aniston may have had the weakest comic chops of the core cast, but her portrayal of Rachel relies on her ability to convey frenzied panic and endless charm in equal measure – and Aniston knocks it out of the park every time.
Hurt: Lauren Tom (Julie)
As we’ve already seen, it’s never a good thing to be a love interest who is so clearly meant to be standing in the way of a bigger love story – especially when that love story is Ross and Rachel, the series’ hallmark story.
Poor Julie never stood a chance, even as she moved from Ross’s girlfriend to friend of the girls and briefly integrated among the friendship circle.
Her time on the series was short, and it just wasn’t meant to be.
However, even within her brief stay, it was clear that Julie was never really going to gel with the group.
This was most noticeably due to the fact that Lauren Tom’s acting style is much more suited to broad family comedy or refined dramatic pieces than the sharp, snarky humor found in Friends.
Saved: Courteney Cox (Monica Geller)
Monica may be the most neurotic and annoying of the friends on many occasions, but there’s no denying that she’s a constant source of entertainment, even if some of it is over the top in the worst of ways.
As the obsessive perfectionist and Chandler’s unlikely dream girl, Monica brought a different kind of annoying judgment to the series than her brother did, but together, the Gellers either work in tandem or cancel one another out – so really, it’s a win either way.
Courteney Cox’s comic skills developed significantly over the series, as she proved herself to be capable of even the most bizarre of feats in time.
Whether relying on Monica’s OCD tendencies, screaming her head off in a competition of any kind, or trying her best to be a romantic lead in her own story, Cox’s Monica becomes one of the most heart-filled characters of the series.
Hurt: Bruce Willis (Paul Stevens)
We have to admit, we’re still scratching our heads over this one.
Ross, as a professor, begins to date one of his students, and suddenly, Rachel begins dating that student’s father.
It’s an awkward storyline that stretches on for longer than it needed to, and a storyline that really would have been awkward regardless of casting. However, it’s the casting of drama and action star Bruce Willis in the role that makes it truly puzzling.
Willis’s Paul Stevens is an uneven character, hammy in one moment and totally cold and refined in the next.
He doesn’t add much of anything to the series, besides yet another instance of stunt casting – something that the series did again, and again, and again.
Saved: Giovanni Ribisi (Frank Buffay, Jr.)
Sometimes, you just need a really good totally over the top character to come in and lighten things up.
In the case of Friends, their most successful out of this world, beyond stupid, entirely lovable character is none other than Phoebe’s younger brother, Frank Buffay, Jr.
He falls in love with his home economics teacher, asks Phoebe to carry his children, and then proceeds to ask Phoebe to take one of his children away when he can’t deal with all three of them.
On paper, he’s not a character who should be funny at all. However, in practice, he provides some of the series’ most ridiculous, laugh out loud moments, all thanks to the quick wit and total commitment to going all in by Giovanni Ribisi.
Hurt: Tate Donovan (Joshua Burgin)
Love interests come and go in a series like Friends where the entire main cast is looking for love everywhere they go. However, few love interests made less sense than Joshua, a man Rachel meets at work and whom she finds herself instantly attracted to.
Beyond their nervous chatter in their first meeting, it’s not clear that they have any chemistry at all, and yet Rachel goes out of her way to try to date him, making a fool out of herself in a process.
It’s not totally clear what the intention behind a character like Joshua was, but the casting of an awkward as ever Tate Donovan certainly didn’t help matters.
More suited to soapy, dramatic material, Donovan feels helplessly out of place in this role, which doesn’t really afford him much of anything to sink his teeth into.
Saved: Elliott Gould (Jack Geller)
The Gellers come with a lot of baggage, a lot of judgment, a lot of snark, and a lot of secrets. Howeverm among all these ridiculous family members, Jack Geller stands out as far and away the best of them all.
Dry, witty, oblivious, and yet always willing to lend a shoulder to cry on for his little Harmonica, Jack was one of the best fathers in the series.
He was as reliable as he was overly honest.
The portrayal of his character by veteran actor Elliott Gould lent some gravity to the role, making him at once even more outlandish and yet all the more grounded in reality.
Few characters within the series were allowed to walk that line, but among the rest, Gould’s performance as the father of the Geller clan succeeded where others could not.
Hurt: Jon Favreau (Pete Becker)
Monica had her fair share of love interests before she and Chandler became a thing, but no love interest had less chemistry with her than the quasi manipulative Pete Becker.
As a millionaire who came onto her via a check and offering her a job, Pete and Monica didn’t have much in common besides their brief attraction to one another, her interest in his money, and his interest in spending it on her wherever possible.
Pete would have been a difficult character for any actor to get right, but Jon Favreau was definitely not the right choice.
The actor, who is now perhaps better known for his work behind the camera, did the best with what he was given.
However, the character was so poorly conceived from the start that there was no way his oafish performance would translate into a character worth caring about.
Saved: Matt LeBlanc (Joey Tribbiani)
It’s not easy playing the same total idiot character for ten years in a row – and then some, if you take Joey and Episodes into account.
However, Matt LeBlanc was the perfect choice for a character like Joey from the very beginning.
Full of heart, charm, and the perfect clueless look that only a true comic talent could provide on a regular basis, LeBlanc’s Joey was simultaneously someone you wanted to be friends with and someone you wanted absolutely nothing to do with.
Although sleazy and creepy on many occasions, and with a clear disinterest in what women want if it doesn’t involve his own pleasure, Joey was a great friend, a good support system, and someone who truly epitomized the series’ refrain of “I’ll be there for you” in the most unexpected of ways.
Hurt: Dina Meyer (Kate Miller)
A character as shrill, as heartless, and frankly as cruel as Kate Miller had absolutely no place being in a series as heartwarming, light, and, well, friendly as Friends.
As one of Joey’s more misguided romantic pursuits, Kate offered absolutely nothing worth including to the series, other than an example of a woman who was somehow immune to Joey’s many charms.
Dina Meyer, likewise, brought nothing remotely suited to the series’ overall comic tone.
Her line delivery was shrill, her emotions nonexistent, and her overall performance robotic.
Opposite the warm and fuzzy performance offered by LeBlanc, she couldn’t have stood in starker – and more unflattering – contrast.
Thankfully, her stay on the series wasn’t all too long, but one could argue that it was too long from the very beginning.
Saved: Paul Rudd (Mike Hannigan)
Finding the perfect man for someone like Phoebe Buffay wasn’t an easy task for the series.
As its most unique and bizarre character, but also one of its most compassionate, Phoebe required someone who would be able to handle her weirdness, but also boast the right amount of heart, too.
Enter Mike Hannigan – a total stranger at the time, who found himself set up on a blind date with Phoebe, only to wind up falling head over heels for Central Perk’s resident weirdo.
Who could blame Phoebe for falling head over heels for him, too?
Played winningly by the endlessly adorable and charming Paul Rudd, Mike was a welcome fixture among the series, even if he struggled at first to integrate with the group.
It was only a matter of time, however, before his nerdy cute humor found the right balance with the gang’s sharply witty tone, allowing Mr. and Mrs. Hannigan to be wed by the gang themselves.
Hurt: Adam Goldberg (Eddie Manoick)
Sometimes, you just have to wonder what the hell a show thought it was doing when it comes to certain characters who are so far off the reservation that the reservation isn’t even in the same country anymore.
Chandler’s brief roommate, Eddie Manoick, is Friends’ version of that.
Completely neurotic, paranoid, and possibly criminal if the angry fits of rage are anything to go by, Eddie was a brief gag that was stretched into three episodes for no apparent reason.
Played by the awkward, uncomfortable, hit-or-miss comedian Adam Goldberg, Eddie was guaranteed to be a polarizing character from the start.
However, his performance, paired with the character’s unbelievably bad writing, produced one of the biggest mistakes in the series’ ten-year run.
Saved: Lisa Kudrow (Phoebe Buffay)
While Eddie is a cautionary tale about just how weird a character can be without going too far, Phoebe is the textbook example of how weirdness can be a good – and, really, a great – thing if done right.
Whether singing her bizarre and often inappropriate songs at Central Perk, showing her street smarts in situations that the other friends are totally useless in, or changing her name to Princess Consuela Banana Hammock, Phoebe is the shining star of the series’ parade of weirdos – and we wouldn’t have it any other way.
With a career-defining turn by Lisa Kudrow, Phoebe became one of the series’ clearest standout characters – for her weirdness, her heart, and her perfect sense of comedic timing.
She plays well off every character she comes into contact with – and in a series full of versatile characters both good and bad, that really says a lot.
