More than two decades after the sitcom ended, Lisa Kudrow has revealed that she and the rest of the Friends cast are still making an obscene amount of money from the show.
Kudrow played Phoebe Buffay in all 10 seasons of Friends, from 1994 to 2004. In an interview with The Times of London, it was revealed that she and the five surviving regular cast members, Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, David Schwimmer and Matt LeBlanc, are still making $20 million a year in residuals. (The article didn’t say where Matthew Perry’s residuals were being directed. He did not have a wife or children.)
When asked why, after over 20 years, Friends is still so popular and earning so much money, Kudrow joked, “Because Phoebe Buffay was so great?”
“After Matthew died, I watched the show again,” Kudrow said, being more serious. “Before, I only saw what I did wrong or could have done better. But for the first time, I truly appreciated just how great it was. I felt I did okay, but Jennifer and Courteney? Amazing. David and Matt? They had me laughing so hard. And then Matthew – he was just beyond us all.”
As popular as ‘Friends’ is and was, it wasn’t always easy
Also, in addition to discussing the good stuff during her interview with The Times, Lisa Kudrow brought up what she said was “mean stuff going on behind the scenes.”
“Don’t forget we were recording in front of a live audience of 400, and if you messed up one of these writers’ lines or it didn’t get the perfect response, they could be like, ‘Can’t the b—- f—— read? She’s not even trying. She f—— up my line,'” Kudrow said.
“And we know that back in the room, the guys would be up late discussing their sexual fantasies about Jennifer and Courteney. It was intense.”
Kudrow is referring to Amaani Lyle, a writer’s assistant who was responsible for transcribing brainstorming sessions with the show’s writers, filing a sexual harassment lawsuit in 1999. Lyle would ultimately lose the lawsuit.
All that being said, Lisa Kudrow still has nothing but good things to say about the show.
“I will never say anything bad about Friends because it’s still incredible work,” she said. “There are plenty of shows with big-name comedians from that time and they are not funny, but Friends is.”