‘Friends’ Writer Says Stars Would ‘Deliberately Tank’ Jokes, ‘Rarely Had Anything Positive To Say’

A former “Friends” writer says that her time on set was less than ideal due in part to the behavior of the sitcom’s top stars.

Patty Lin described what it was like working on the hit NBC series in her book, “End Credits: How I Broke Up with Hollywood.” An excerpt recently appeared in Time.

Lin said she wasn’t sure about joining the writers on season 7 of the show because she was new to the industry and didn’t have comedy experience. But because “Friends” was so popular at the time, the writer said she would have been a “fool” to “pass up the chance.”

“Friends” ran for ten seasons from 1994 until 2004. The comedy starred Jennifer Aniston (Rachel Green), Courteney Cox (Monica Geller), David Schwimmer (Ross Geller), Matt LeBlanc (Joey Tribiani), Lisa Kudrow (Phoebe Buffay), and Matthew Perry (Chandler Bing).

“At first, I was excited about table reads because I got to be in the same room as the cast, who were Big Stars,” Lin said. “Plus, there was a catered breakfast buffet: fluffy scrambled eggs, crispy bacon, pancakes, waffles, pastries of all kinds. On the way to the table reads, I would start salivating like one of Pavlov’s dogs.”

She continued, “But the novelty of seeing Big Stars up close wore off fast, along with my zeal about breakfast. The actors seemed unhappy to be chained to a tired old show when they could be branching out, and I felt like they were constantly wondering how every given script would specifically serve them.”

Lin went on to claim that the show’s leads would intentionally sabotage jokes they didn’t like. 

“They all knew how to get a laugh, but if they didn’t like a joke, they seemed to deliberately tank it, knowing we’d rewrite it,” Lin explained. “Dozens of good jokes would get thrown out just because one of them had mumbled the line through a mouthful of bacon.”

She partly blamed the show’s creators for not stepping in to help. “David [Krane] and Marta [Kauffman] never said, ‘This joke is funny. The actor just needs to sell it.’”

Lin said there was a lot of negativity on set. “Everyone would sit around Monica and Chandler’s apartment and discuss the script,” she said. “This was the actors’ first opportunity to voice their opinions, which they did vociferously. They rarely had anything positive to say, and when they brought up problems, they didn’t suggest feasible solutions.”

“Seeing themselves as guardians of their characters, they often argued that they would never do or say such-and-such. That was occasionally helpful, but overall, these sessions had a dire, aggressive quality that lacked all the levity you’d expect from the making of a sitcom,” she continued.

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She also described the rest of the show’s writers room as “cliquey” and said she “felt like an outsider.”

“In theory, ‘breaking’ stories on ‘Friends’—plotting out an episode’s scenes—should’ve gone faster than on dramas, since sitcoms are only half as long and have fewer story beats,” Lin said in her book.

“Even so, there was a lot of sitting around the table in silence. Trust me, any show that makes it to season 7 is hurting for ideas. Much of the time, the writers’ room was like an endless cocktail party where we had run out of polite things to talk about. And so we talked about sex. Constantly.”

Lin said she was “relieved” when her option wasn’t picked up for the following season, which she said is the writer’s equivalent of being fired. She went on to work for other popular shows, including “Desperate Housewives” and “Breaking Bad.” 

Her overall thoughts on “Friends” is that it taught her an important lesson. Lin said she “didn’t learn that much, except that I never wanted to work on a sitcom again.”

“But the choice had been clear at the time,” she said. “And, for better or worse, ‘Friends’ would remain my most recognizable credit.”