‘It wasn’t that funny’: Lisa Kudrow says Friends live audience laughing made her really angry

‘They were laughing for too long’

4 months ago | UPDATED 5 hours ago

Lisa Kudrow has very bluntly explained how the live audience of Friends laughing at the show really wound her up and made her angry, and it’s kind of iconic how much she’s dragged them.

Speaking in a new interview with Conan O’Brien for his podcast Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend, Lisa Kudrow absolutely went in on the live audience Friends would film its episodes in front of. In case you forgot or thought that the laughter you hear when watching Friends was fake – it was actually shot in front of a crowd.

Lisa Kudrow said the live audience of Friends actually got on her nerves. The Phoebe Buffay actress said “They were laughing for too long. It wasn’t that funny. That’s why. It wasn’t an honest response and it irritated me. Now you’re just ruining the timing of the rest of the show. There are other lines… A TV show is not for the studio audience. It is made for the TV viewers at home. That’s who we are in service to. If it was a stage play, yeah, laugh as long as you want.”

She continued: “It’s like, ‘now you’re just ruining the timing of the rest of the show.’ Sometimes I would just look out if they’d been laughing too long, and go, ‘come on.’ Really angry.”

Like, Lisa Kudrow did NOT mince her words about the audience. “It’s made for the TV viewers at home. That’s who we’re in service to. If it were a stage play – yeah, laugh as long as you want! I’ll figure out things to keep my character busy, waiting to continue with it, that’s fine. But then, it’s being filmed, and now I’m just sort of like standing there.”