Picture this: Friends without Phoebe Buffay. Yeah, no “Smelly Cat,” no banana phone, no “My eyes! My eyes!” Basically, a world none of us want to live in. But believe it or not, Lisa Kudrow almost called it quits after Season 3—and it took some Joey Tribbiani-level persuasion from Matt LeBlanc to change her mind.
By Season 3, Kudrow was running on fumes. She was playing the delightfully weird Phoebe on Friends and juggling her role as Ursula, Phoebe’s downright mean twin, on Mad About You. That double life? Exhausting. To make matters worse, her real-life sister Helena stepped in as Ursula’s stunt double for twin scenes, which only made things weirder. Imagine acting opposite “yourself,” but it’s actually your sibling? Yeah, not exactly a breeze.
“I was over it,” Lisa Kudrow admitted during an appearance on Kevin Nealson’s Hiking With Kevin YouTube show. “I felt like I tricked everyone into thinking I could play Phoebe. I wasn’t naturally like her, and it felt like hard work all the time.” Phoebe Buffay—our chaotic queen of one-liners—almost disappeared because Lisa felt like an imposter.
Enter Matt LeBlanc, aka Joey Tribbiani, aka the chillest man on set. He noticed Kudrow struggling and asked her, “What’s going on with you?” When she spilled about her self-doubt and said she didn’t think she could keep going, LeBlanc didn’t sugarcoat his response.
“You’ve been doing this f*cking character for three years. Relax. You’re her. You’ve got it,” LeBlanc told Kudrow. He even called her out for overthinking, telling her to chill and just be Phoebe. In true Joey fashion, he served the perfect mix of tough love and encouragement.
And boy, did it work. Kudrow stayed on—and thank goodness, because let’s face it, Friends without Phoebe would’ve been like Central Perk without its orange couch: incomplete and kinda sad.
It’s wild to think about now, but Kudrow’s off-screen bond with her castmates mirrored the on-screen magic we all fell in love with. That tight-knit vibe wasn’t just acting—it was real. LeBlanc stepping in to keep Kudrow from quitting shows how much they all had each other’s backs, even when the cameras weren’t rolling.
Next time you hear Smelly Cat or a classic Phoebe one-liner, remember—it almost didn’t happen. Matt LeBlanc saved the day, keeping the quirky glue of the gang intact. It turns out that Phoebe needed a friend, too. Lucky for us, Joey’s “How you doin’?” charm showed up just in time.
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