Yahoo Movies Jennifer Aniston was not always there for the Friends reunion — why she had to walk off set a few times
The Friends reunion was a bright spot in a year that's somehow still going. Fans of the show collectively sighed in nostalgic glee as Jennifer Aniston, David Schwimmer, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Courteney Cox, and Matthew Perry sat around and reminisced about the good old, Must See TV days. But emotions were running high for nearly everyone on the set.
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Aniston reveals she was so overcome with emotion while filming the reunion, which aired on HBO Max back in May, she had to excuse herself from the set a few times.
"I think we were just so naive walking into it, thinking, 'How fun is this going to be? They're putting the sets back together, exactly as they were,' " Aniston says. "Then you get there and it's like, 'Oh right, I hadn't thought about what was going on the last time I was actually here.' "
"And it just took me by surprise because it was like, 'Hi, past, remember me? Remember how that sucked? You thought everything was in front of you and life was going to be just gorgeous and then you went through maybe the hardest time in your life?' It was all very jarring and, of course, you've got cameras everywhere and I'm already a little emotionally accessible, I guess you could say, so I had to walk out at certain points. I don't know how they cut around it."
HBO Max Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Matthew Perry, Lisa Kudrow, David Schwimmer, and Matt LeBlanc on 'Friends: The Reunion.'
Aniston had previously discussed the emotional weight of getting back together with her Friends, telling Rob Lowe on his podcast Literally! how at one point they had all descended into tears.
"Going back there, it's nostalgic in a way that's kind of also a little melancholy, you know? Because a lot has changed and we have all gone down different roads, not so easy and some easy... for each of us," Aniston explained. "There was a period where we were all kind of in a puddle."
Still, Aniston can't quite seem to leave the eternally popular sitcom behind. The actress was among the cavalcade of stars in the third installment of Live in Front of a Studio Audience, playing Blair Warner during a recreation of a Facts of Life episode. Aniston caps her final scene with an echo of the Friends theme song, telling co-star Jon Stewart, "I'll be there for you."
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