Jennifer Aniston says ‘whole generation’ finds Friends offensive today
She says comedy has ‘evolved’ since the show first aired back in the 1990s
The actress who was 54 years old and played Rachel Green in the popular TV show for ten years thinks that comedy has changed a lot over time. She says that people nowadays might be surprised by what was considered funny in the 90s.
Aniston, while talking about her new movie Murder Mystery 2, mentioned to AFP that things are a bit more complicated these days, making it ‘really tough for comedians.’
She mentioned that there are many young people who are watching old episodes of ‘Friends’ and feeling offended.
Some things happened that we didn’t mean to do, and other things… we really should have considered more carefully. But honestly, I don’t think we were as aware back then as we are today.
Aniston mentioned that comedy and movies have changed over time. She said, “It’s a bit complicated now because you have to be really cautious, which makes it tough for comedians. The great thing about comedy is that we poke fun at ourselves and at life.”
She mentioned that in the past, it was okay to make fun of a bigot and laugh about it – that was so funny. It was all about showing how silly some people were. But now, she thinks we can’t do that anymore.
Lately, people have been saying that the show hasn’t aged well. In 2019, Marta Kauffman, who wrote Friends, said that they might not have used the right words when talking about transgender people on the show, and that they would do it differently if they were making it now.
Kauffman mentioned that we didn’t really understand transgender people at that time, so we might not have used the right words.
“I don’t know if I would have known those terms back then. I think that’s the biggest one.”
Kauffman confirmed that she was referring to Chandler Bing’s father when asked about the storyline.
People who watched the show might recall that Chandler’s dad, Charles, was portrayed by Kathleen Turner. Charles had a drag performance called Viva Las Gaygas, where she performed under the name Helena Handbasket.
Turner also talked about the show in an interview with Gay Times. She said, “I feel like it hasn’t aged well. It was just a short sitcom. It got really popular, but people didn’t really see it as a serious social commentary.”
When they asked me, they said, “Do you want to be the first woman to play a man who is playing a woman?” I said yes, because there weren’t a lot of drag/trans people on TV back then.
Featured Image Credit: Alamy/Lisa Werner/MARKA
