It's a sad fact of life that the very TV series that have given us so much joy throughout the years were often each a locked room full of bees behind the scenes. Yes, it would have been great to know that the entire cast of, say, True Detective hung out outside of work and shared some cream sodas, but the reality is usually that these highly paid actors are smashed together into an ensemble of other egos, barely tolerating each other, and things only deteriorate from there.
So the next time you're watching your favorite show, remember that every time the director yelled "Cut!" the hilarious jokes and tense drama were replaced with stuff like ...
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Matthew Perry Was So High While Making Friends That He Can't Remember Three Seasons
When you think of all the times that Chandler from Friends made you belly laugh, you're already doing better than he is in the memory department. Matthew Perry claims that he has a blank space in his brain where roughly seasons three through six should be. Which is a tragedy, because those seasons comprise all the appearances of the greatest characters in the show:
Warner Bros. TelevisionThis means Perry also doesn't remember the spinoff cartoon in which Duck and Chick solve mysteries.
During a BBC interview, Perry was asked for his personal least favorite episode of the show, to which he responded, "I think the answer is, I don't remember three years of it, so none of those. I was a little out of it at the time." Perry has stated that he started taking painkillers around that time so he wouldn't drink too much alcohol, but then he became addicted to them. He entered rehab in 2001, bringing with him crippling addictions to Vicodin, methadone, amphetamines, and, oh yeah, booze too. So maybe don't try this method.
Perry claimed that he never worked on the show while drunk, though he was "painfully hungover" a great deal of the time, which probably made it even harder than usual to deal with Ross' wimpy crap. Anyway, good on him for getting (and staying) clean. Now if only we could all find a way to collectively erase Joey that doesn't involve brain damage ...
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Scully Wasn't Allowed To Walk Next To Mulder On The X-Files
The playful dynamic between The X-Files' Scully and Mulder was the main reason most people tuned in to a show that had a character with the official name of "Cigarette Smoking Man." It was kind of like Jim and Pam from The Office, if Jim and Pam also came across a rogue alien penis from time to time.
But the sparks weren't exactly manifesting in real life. Viewers wondered weekly if the two would ever get together, but folks on The X-Files had more pressing concerns. Gillian Anderson time and again had to fight to not only get equal pay, but to even stand next to her counterpart. For the first few seasons, the show's producers insisted that she stay a few feet behind Duchovny while also making far less money than he did. In their minds, it was a show about Mulder's sexual tension with ... the truth? Werewolves?
20th TelevisionHimself?
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