Jennifer Aniston Speaks About How Pay Differences Would Have ‘Destroyed’ Friends Cast

Everyone knows and loves Friends. Despite the show’s humor and immense success, Jennifer Aniston, who played Rachel, shares that the differences in the actors’ salaries could have almost “destroyed” the cast.

Friends and Payment

Everyone’s favorite sitcom, Friends, first aired in the 1990s. The show became a huge hit, and each of the cast was earning $1 million per episode by the final episode in May 2004. It doesn’t sound so bad, right? However, things were different at the beginning.

When the second series started airing, Jennifer Aniston and David Schwimmer were earning a higher salary than their co-stars. Aniston shared that the situation made her feel “uneasy.” In the spirit of friendship and solidarity, the two fought with production so that all six leading cast members could be equally paid. Jennifer stated, “It would’ve destroyed us, I think if someone was soaring financially.”

Friendship Over Money

The Friends cast was convinced that since all the cast was doing equal work, they all deserved the same amount of money. She shared she would feel horrible getting a higher salary than someone doing an equally good job. Both Schwimmer and Aniston took pay cuts. However, by the time seasons 9 and 10 started airing, the whole cast was making the same amount of money.

At the end of both seasons, each of the six cast members had earned about $40 million. Friends co-creator Marta Kauffman had previously shared that, in her opinion, a million dollars an episode was “kinda ridiculous” and was too much to be realistic.

Jennifer’s IVF Journey

Jennifer also shared that her colleague and good friend Adam Sandler sends her flowers on Mother’s Day every year. The actress has previously opened up about struggling with fertility. Last year, she commented on how she did everything to start a family in her 30s and 40s. She said, “All the years and years and years of speculation… It was really hard. I was going through IVF, drinking Chinese teas, you name it.” Despite not being a mother yet, she feels relieved that she doesn’t have to think about it anymore.