The cast of the popular 90s series “Friends” is bringing home the bacon.
Reunited and It Feels Good
Jennifer Aniston, Lisa Kudrow, Courteney Cox, David Schwimmer, Matt LeBlanc, and Matthew Perry will be making at least $2.5 million each for the reunion special, according to the report released by Variety last February 21.
The original offer was at $1 million each, the same amount they were earning for every episode for the final two seasons of “Friends.” However, all six actors turned down the offer, according to the report by the Wall Street Journal.
HBO Max has already made the announcement in a statement on Friday, confirming the reunion of all six of its original cast members in an untitled, unscripted special. It will be filmed on the original 24 sound stages in the Warner Bros. Studio lot.
Kevin Reilly, chief content officer of HBO Max and President of TBS, TNT and truTV, said in a statement: “I became aware of “Friends” when it was in its early stages of development and then I had the opportunity to work on the series many years later. I am delighted to see it being able to catch on with viewers generation after generation.”
“Guess you can call this the one where they all got back together,” Reilly added. The production will be bringing back David, Jennifer, Courteney, Matt, Lisa and Matthew for an HBO Max special program along with the “Friends” library.
“Friends” for Life
The exciting new development of all six original cast members in one show has got all of them pumped up, too.
They shared the good news on their private Instagram pages. Their followers and fans were quick to leave positive responses to the caption “It’s happening” that came with the same “Friends” poster. They were in a retro ensemble from a photoshoot they did together years ago.
Their celebrity friends could not help but feel excited about the reunion as well, with the likes of Kate Hudson and Sarah Hyland commenting.
“I feel like the whole world just had a collective orgasm,” Hudson commented on Aniston’s post on Friday.
“EXCUSE ME?!” wrote Sarah Hyland along with crying emojis and a lot of hearts.
The Reunion Special
The reunion special will be aired on HBO Max. The same executive producers will be working on it, namely Kevin Bright, Marta Kauffman and David Crane. The special show will be the first time all six actors will appear on screen together since their finale in May of 2004.
Although the majority of the cast had a small reunion in 2016 for an NBC special in honor of Television director James Burrows, Matthew Perry had a previous commitment and was not able to make it.
The “Friends” reunion special and all of their 236 episodes will be available to all subscribers of HBO Max for the whole month of May.