Editor's note: The following contains spoilers for Friends: The Reunion.
In case you missed the big old spoiler warning at the top of this article, consider this your second warning: we will be discussing the biggest Friends reunion special surprises below, so proceed at your own risk. Because trust us, there are some major revelations.
Friends fans have been waiting a long time to see the full cast reunited, and that time finally came with HBO Max’s one-hour-and-44-minute special Friends: The Reunion. It begins in a rather emotional way, as each cast member – Jennifer Aniston, Lisa Kudrow, Courteney Cox, David Schwimmer, Matthew Perry, and Matt LeBlanc – walks back onto the soundstage where they shot Friends to find their iconic sets recreated. The camera follows as the gang walks around, recalling memories and sharing stories from their 10 years of making one of the greatest shows ever to air on television.
But while the Friends reunion special has celebrity guests and surprise encounters and even a trivia match, it’s at its most interesting when the actors are talking about their experience making the show. And it’s in those discussions that some revelations – ranging from amusing to jaw-dropping – are unveiled.
If you want a bit of a heads up, we’ve compiled the biggest Friends reunion special reveals below. But if you want to go in cold, head over to HBO Max to watch the special now! Without further ado, here's what we learned.
Courteney Cox Used to Write Her Lines on the Dining Room Table
One of the more interesting revelations comes early in the special, as LeBlanc recalls how Cox used to write her lines on the dining room table in Monica and Rachel’s apartment. One day right before filming, LeBlanc asked Cox what was on the table, and she told him to mind his own business. So he wiped the lines clean before that night’s taping, and says she was “so mad” at him when they started filming.
David Schwimmer Was Not a Fan of Marcel the Monkey
You may or may not recall that at one point, Friends had a monkey. Marcel was introduced in the show’s first season, and while Aniston recalls how she loved Marcel, Schwimmer reveals he was not Marcel’s biggest fan. “First of all, I want to say I love animals,” the actor said before he launched into a very funny tirade about how Marcel ruined takes:
“Here is my problem: the monkey obviously was trained, and it had to hit its mark and do its thing at the perfect time. But what inevitably began to happen was we’d have choreographed bits timed out, and it would get messed up because the monkey didn’t do its job right. So we’d have to reset, we’d have to go again because the monkey didn’t get it right.”
Not only did Marcel ruin takes, he would also make a mess of Schwimmer’s face when he was being fed in between scenes:
“When the monkey was resting it would sit on my shoulder, and the trainer would come up and just give the monkey live grubs to eat. So the monkey would be sitting on my shoulder, take some grubs, like break ‘em in half and eat it, and then he’d just go like that (Schwimmer puts his hands on his face). So I’d have monkey grubby hands all over. It was time for Marcel to fuck off (laughs).”
Matt LeBlanc Dislocated His Shoulder Filming “The One Where No One’s Ready”
While Friends was a sitcom, it wasn’t immune to onset accidents. In the iconic Season 3 episode “The One Where No One’s Ready,” Joey and Chandler are fighting over a chair, and at one point they each race to said chair before Joey sits down in it. On the fourth take of the scene, LeBlanc came down hard on his shoulder and dislocated it. They shut down production and had to wait until LeBlanc’s arm healed before they could shoot the end of the episode, since the episode involved all the cast members in the same room. But this explains why, for the show’s next episode, it opens with Joey falling off his bed offscreen, leading to him wearing a sling for the rest of the episode.
LeBlanc explains that the cast normally did a huddle before filming each episode, but because they were running late that night they didn’t do one for “The One Where No One’s Ready.” From then on, LeBlanc made sure they huddled before taping each episode.
Jennifer Aniston and David Schwimmer Admit They Had Feelings for One Another
The biggest revelation in the Friends reunion special is a true shocker. During the Q&A portion of the special, moderator James Corden asks if anyone had any offscreen romances. Aniston and Schwimmer look at one another, before Schwimmer drops the bombshell.
“The first season I had a major crush on Jen,” Schwimmer says, to which Aniston adds that she had a crush on him too. “And at some point,” Schwimmer continues, “we were both crushing hard on each other. But it was like two ships passing because one of us was always in a relationship, and we never crossed that boundary. We respected that.” Immediately LeBlanc chimes in with a “Bullshit!” but Aniston puts up her hand as if to say “I swear,” and LeBlanc admits he was kidding.
But Aniston continued, adding that she and Schwimmer had their first kiss ever – one they were both anticipating – onscreen when Ross and Rachel first kiss:
“Honestly I remember saying one time to David, ‘It’s gonna be such a bummer if the first time you and I kiss is gonna be on national television.’ Sure enough, the first time we kissed was in that coffee shop. So we just channeled all of our adoration and love for each other into Ross and Rachel.”
After this revelation, the special shows that kissing scene in full along with a table read with present-day Schwimmer and Aniston reading the scene aloud to one another, and the chemistry is palpable. This honestly explains why the Ross and Rachel relationship hit so hard – the actors were truly channeling their feelings for one another into their characters.
Although as Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez have proved, it’s never too late. Right??
The Cast Is Adamantly Against Making a Friends Movie
When asked if there will ever be a Friends movie, the cast unanimously answers “no,” with Kudrow explaining why a Friends movie would ruin the ending of the show:
“No because that’s all up to [creators] Marta [Kaufman] and David [Crane], and I once heard them say – and I completely agree – that they ended the show very nicely. Everyone’s lives are very nice, and they would have to unravel all those good things in order for there to be stories, and I don’t want anyone’s happy ending unraveled. Also at my age to be floopy? Stop!”
Speaking of happy endings…
The Cast Revealed Where Their Characters Are Now
To wrap things up, the cast was asked what they think happened to their characters. For Ross and Rachel, Aniston says they got married “and had some kids and you’re still playing with bones,” a line that puts LeBlanc in stitches.
Cox says although Monica and Chandler’s kids are likely now graduated, Monica is still “really competitive” and active in the PTA, and that Chandler is making her laugh every day.
According to Kudrow, Phoebe is still happily married to Mike (played by Paul Rudd) and living in Connecticut. “They had kids,” she says, “and I think she was like the advocate for her kids who were a little different and all kids who were a little different, the arts program, the music thing and all that.”
And Joey? LeBlanc says he’s opened a sandwich shop somewhere in Venice Beach.
Friends: The Reunion is streaming now on HBO Max, along with every episode of Friends.