The Poster Memorabilia blog

The Best Friends A Guy Could Ever Ask For

A tip-off, a late-night skit, and six signatures collected the long way round.

By an anonymous Hollywood insider

I don't care what anybody says, Friends is still the best sitcom of all time for me. Whether it has aged well or not, or whether another sitcom inspired it, doesn't matter. The show was funny and gave so many people comfort for ten years. That's a true mark of a really good show.

I'm not a white New Yorker myself, but I always related to what those six characters were going through. Getting confused about whether my girlfriend and I were “on a break.” Wanting my home to be as clean as possible. And growing up with a lot of sisters. At least one thing about each of those friends mirrored my life.

“Friends is still the best sitcom of all time for me.”

So no matter how much people revise history and go on YouTube or social media to say that Friends wasn't all that great, it's still the GOAT for me. Different strokes for different folks, I guess. And while I agree that many things about it didn't age well, I still find every episode funny as hell.

There was a time that I made Friends my entire personality, too. I collected every piece of merchandise and memorabilia I could get my hands on. And the best thing I have now is that iconic poster of them drinking their milkshakes. I love it so much that I eventually had the cast sign it.

It was really hard because that cast was notorious for not reuniting, at least in public, at all. Two of them might appear on the red carpet together, but it was never all six of them. Courteney Cox once said she'd spent ten years trying to organize a simple cast dinner and it never happened. I figured I'd have to track them down one by one.

I practically did that, actually, but luck was on my side in 2014. Well, luck and a few connections.

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A little birdie told me that three of the women from Friends would put on a surprise skit at Jimmy Kimmel's late-night talk show. So I scored tickets for that episode and brought my poster to finally get it signed. I was all smug watching the show because I was the only one prepared to see them in person.

Lo and behold, Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, and Lisa Kudrow did show up at Jimmy Kimmel Live! and acted out his Friends fan fiction, complete with a replica of Monica's kitchen. I knew it was all gonna happen, but I was still stunned to see them together again. I screamed as if I were just as surprised as the rest of the audience.

After the show, I waited for them by the stage door and asked them to sign my poster. They looked confused about why I had it ready since their whole thing was a surprise, but I said I just bought it before going to the show and that it was a coincidence.

After that, I went to practically every event the guys appeared at to get their autographs. I saw David Schwimmer at Vulture Festival in 2016, Matthew Perry at a Tribeca Film Festival event in 2017, and Matt LeBlanc at Stacy Keach's Hollywood Walk of Fame star ceremony in 2019.

It clearly took me years to complete them all, but I don't regret anything. That poster means even more to me now that we've lost Matthew, and there's no version of me that ever lets it go. If you're a Friends fan too, I hope you find your own way to hold onto the show.

Some things you watch. This one you keep.

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