'Friends' special 'in talks' for HBO Max

The cast of the television show "Friends" appears at the 54th annual Emmy Awards in Los Angeles. Picture: Reuters

The cast of the television show "Friends" appears at the 54th annual Emmy Awards in Los Angeles. Picture: Reuters

Published Nov 13, 2019

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A "Friends" special is reportedly in talks at HBO Max after the company obtained the rights to the hit US sitcom for their new streaming service.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, a one-off special could be heading to the new streaming service, which launches next year, 25 years after the original US sitcom debuted on NBC.

It's claimed that all of the six man cast members -

Courteney Cox (Monica Geller), Jennifer Aniston (Rachel Green), Lisa Kudrow (Phoebe Buffay), David Schwimmer (Ross Geller), Matthew Perry (Chandler Bing) and Matt LeBlanc (Joey Tribbiani) - will be reprising their respective roles.

The show's creators, David Crane and Marta Kauffman, are also said to be returning.

In July, it was reported that WarnerMedia, which owns HBO Max, had obtained the rights to 'Friends' - which originally aired between 1994 and 2004 - after a bidding war with Netflix, who are removing the show from their service.

HBO Max is said to have paid R1.2 billion per year in a five-year deal for the streaming rights, which are worth R6.3 billion.

The news comes weeks after Jennifer Aniston "broke the internet" when she shared a picture of the cast members reuniting on Instagram.

Alongside the blurry selfie, Jennifer wrote: "And now we're Instagram FRIENDS too. HI INSTAGRAM (sic)."

However, once people got wind that she had joined the popular website, the application crashed temporarily due to the high number of follower requests.

In just four hours, the "Horrible Bosses" star had gained 300,000 followers.

Although the cast had been certain they would never reunite, Jennifer admitted in June: "I would do it.

"The girls would do it. And the boys would do it, I'm sure."

Crane and Kauffman had also been adamant they would never revive the show.

The latter said earlier this year: "We will not be doing a reunion show, we will not be doing a reboot. The show was about that time in life when friends are your family."

And Crane added: "We did the show we wanted to do. We got it right, and we put a bow on it."

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