Friends Reunion Special at HBO Max Officially Confirmed

An unscripted Friends reunion special will be available on HBO Max when the new streaming platform launches in May, the company has announced. Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Matthew Perry, and David Schwimmer are all confirmed to return. The cast will record the special on the original soundstage where the show began filming about 25 years ago. Variety says each cast member is making $2.5 million for the reunion while The Hollywood Reporter says that payday could be as high as $3 million each. “Guess you could call this the one where they all got back together — we are reuniting with David, Jennifer, Courteney, Matt, Lisa, and Matthew for an HBO Max special that will be programmed alongside the entire Friends library,” said Kevin Reilly, chief content officer of HBO Max and president of TBS, TNT, and truTV. “I became aware of Friends when it was in the very early stages of development and then had the opportunity to work on the series many years later and have delighted in seeing it catch on with viewers generation after generation. It taps into an era when friends – and audiences – gathered together in real time and we think this reunion special will capture that spirit, uniting original and new fans.” The special was first reported to be in development in November 2019. That was after months of the cast answering questions about whether any sort of Friends reunion or reboot will take place. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2019/10/30/green-lantern-tv-show-coming-to-hbo-max-ign-now"] "...a reboot of the show? No," Aniston said on The Ellen DeGeneres Show in October. "We would love for there to be something, but we don't know what that something is. So, we're just trying. We're working on something." Friends aired 236 episodes from 1994 to 2004 on NBC. According to The New York Times, the Friends series finale was watched by more than 52.5 million people. That audience hasn't died down with People writing that Friends was the second most popular show on Netflix. The series left Netflix at the end of 2019 and every episode will be available on HBO Max at launch. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=everything-coming-to-hbo-max&captions=true"] HBO Max will have a hefty slate at launch including Joker, South Park, and the first three seasons of Rick and Morty. And there will reportedly be unlimited password sharing at launch to get your friends hooked. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Petey Oneto is a freelance writer for IGN who will buy a year's worth of HBO Max if Ed, Edd n Eddy is on it.