Lisa Kudrow Says a 'Friends' Reboot Would Be 'Sad,' and She's Totally Right

Some things should stay in the '90s. 'Friends' is one of them.

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Of all the wonderful and bizarre things that happened in the '90s, the TV show Friends is perhaps the most deeply beloved thing that also should never be touched with a ten foot pole. The show is funny enough (although re-watching it nowadays presents a litany of deeply problematic concepts and jokes), it was an influential sitcom, and it remains the most memorable thing on all the six starring actors’ resumes. Is that not enough? Why must we torment ourselves with the never-ending trauma of a possible revival, reboot, or reunion movie? It’s all just too damn much. It’s 2018, Black Panther is less than a month away, and even Lisa Kudrow, who played Phoebe during the show's entire run from 1994 to 2004, agrees that it would just be a “sad” idea.

On Thursday night’s episode of Conan with Conan O’Brien, Kudrow reviewed one of the most realistic trailers for a Friends movie. It was published a little over a week ago and already has over seven million views, which I guess is impressive—but then again, the Internet has achieved much stranger feats. “I don’t know what to make of it,” Kudrow said. “It’s just like these weird clips from things that clearly have nothing to do with Friends."

Kudrow had already seen the trailer—Courteney Cox, who played Monica, showed it to her and asked, “What do we do?” Kudrow, ever the rational one, said: “Nothing.”

“They’re rebooting everything, but, I don’t know, how does that work with Friends, though?” Kudrow asked, making yet another very good point. “I mean, that was about people in their 20s, 30s. The show isn’t about people in their 40s, 50s. If we have the same problems, then that’s just sad. That’s not fun!”

It does seem like every two minutes there’s another network or movie studio announcing yetanother reboot or revival of yet another once beloved TV show or movie. Some of these might turn out to be great, but reboot fatigue is real, and especially with a show like Friends that is inextricable from the era in which it was originally made. Some things should just stay in the past—after all, all 10 seasons of Friends is on Netflix for any and all binge-watching urges.

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