Friends star Jane Sibbett has spoken about how she once received abuse after starring in a lesbian wedding scene on the show.
The actor played Ross’s (David Schwimmer) ex-wife Carol Willick, who came out as gay in the sitcom following her affair with future wife Susan.
Following her marriage scene with Susan in 1996, Sibbett said she faced a lot of backlash over her character’s sexuality.
She told The Sun: “I would say there was 95 per cent support but once I had flown to Canada to shoot a Disney movie and a child was yelling at me out of a school window. He was shouting, ‘Go home, American f*g’ and I just went, ‘Wow, wrong on so many levels dude. Come down here and have a conversation with me’.
“Then I had a woman from my old church call me up… and proceeded to tell me that I was going to burn in hell.”
David Schwimmer holds a baby, as actors Jessica Hecht (L) and Jane Sibbett look on, in ‘Friends,’ CREDIT: Fotos International/Getty Images
Sibbett went on to explain that even her father refused to watch the show after the scene was aired.
She continued: “It caused stress in my own family. We had a big situation with my father who wouldn’t watch the show. Thankfully he came around to it in the end.
“It was heartbreaking that he wouldn’t watch it. He would hold a bible study group at the time it aired to ensure his friends wouldn’t see it either. It took my godfather writing a letter to him saying how proud he was of me for the wedding scene that cracked it for my father.”
The show is currently celebrating its 30th anniversary and to mark it, a Friends game show is being made.
Titled Fast Friends, the four-part HBO Max show will be filmed inside The Friends Experience: The One in New York, a two-story, 17,000 square-foot attraction featuring various recreated sets from the hit show. Production begins next month, but a transmission date has not yet been confirmed.
The pilot episode of Friends aired 30 years ago on Sunday (September 22). It ran for 10 seasons, ending in May 2004.
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