The Perfect 'Friends' Cast if the Sitcom Were Made Today
Christine is a freelance writer for Collider with two decades of experience covering all types of TV shows and movies spanning every genre. With a particular affinity for dramas, true crime, sitcoms, and thrillers, if it's a top TV show, Christine has likely watched it and is eager to share her thoughts. When she's not furiously writing away, you can find her enjoying the next binge obsession with a glass of wine in front of the TV.
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Fancasting is a popular pastime. Don't you love to look at classic shows, wonder what the characters might look like if the show were made today, then picture current celebrities in the key and supporting roles? Friends is the perfect show to do this with. The iconic sitcom features a mixed bag of personalities. It's famously known for lacking diversity, and you can't help but wonder who might play each of the characters in a modern-day version.
The way the characters look might change, but with the right actors playing them, their essence would remain. Consider that while most of the cast was in their mid-to-late 20s and early 30s when the series started, celebrities today tend to look younger than ever. That means casting a 35-to-40-year-old wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility. When you consider who's hot right now, a few names stand out as actors who could nail these characters in a modern-day dream casting scenario.
1 Rachel Green: Sydney Sweeney
Sydney Sweeney is this generation's "it" girl — a status that Jennifer Aniston, who played Rachel Green, understood all too well at the height of Friends' success. Sweeney has proven herself capable of handling both drama and comedy in shows like Euphoria. Though that HBO series has some of the heaviest TV episodes of the last 20 years, there are also lighter moments. Sweeney's whiny and at times insufferable character Cassie sometimes delivers laughs, whether intentionally or unintentionally. Sweeney also starred in the romantic comedy Anyone But You, where she showed off more of her comedy talents.
She has the same distinct look Aniston does — a beauty that stands out from others. We could totally see whoever plays Ross having pined for her since they were in high school. And Sweeney would be believable as the runaway bride who works as a waitress in a coffee shop until pursuing a career in fashion.
Honorable mentions: Jenna Ortega (her comedic timing is brilliant); Zendaya (she's a consummate pro who can tackle any role).
2 Ross Geller: Jesse Eisenberg
Fans either loved or hated Ross, played by David Schwimmer, who came across as annoying and complaining at times. But deep down, he was a good guy who not everyone understood. He lacked confidence in himself and couldn't seem to figure out his love life until the bitter end of the show.
Jesse Eisenberg is a perfect actor to play him. He's known for playing anxious characters, which fits right into the Ross wheelhouse. His characters are often intelligent, but also socially awkward like Ross. From portraying Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network to the illusionist in Now You See Me, one of those perfect action movies anyone can enjoy, his resume speaks for itself. While he's already in his 40s, Eisenberg still has a boyish face, so he could pull off early 30s.
Honorable mentions: Jay Baruchel (he plays the awkwardly confident nerd so well); Tyler James Williams (his uptight and awkward character in Abbott Elementary proves he has what it takes).
3 Chandler Bing: Daniel Radcliffe
It would take a huge actor to tackle the role of Chandler Bing, and Daniel Radcliffe could be a good fit. While he's best known for playing Harry Potter in that massive franchise, it's easy to forget that he also portrayed "Weird Al" Yankovic in the musical parody Weird: The Al Yankovic Story. He's also currently killing it in the sitcom The Rise and Fall of Reggie Dinkins. He knows how to command a screen like the late Matthew Perry does, and he has demonstrated his skill for comedic timing as well.
Chandler often used sarcasm and self-deprecation to hide his insecurities, and we could totally see Radcliffe doing the same. He isn't afraid to be silly either, playing everything from a flatulent dead body in Swiss Army Man to several humorous characters in Miracle Workers. Though older than Perry was when he started on Friends, Radcliffe forever has that youthful look.
Honorable mentions: Skylar Astin (he has a similar look and a reputation for playing sweet and likable characters); Joe Keery (the flowing hair and talent for sarcasm in Stranger Things make him a viable candidate).
Collider Exclusive · 8 Questions · 2 Minutes Which Iconic Fandom Should You Join? Harry Potter · Lord of the Rings · Star Wars · Star Trek
Eight honest questions about how you actually are: what you put on when you need cheering up, how deep you go into the things you love, what you argue about, what you keep on your shelf. Answer them and we will tell you where you belong. Four of the biggest fandoms on earth are taking new members, and they could not be more different from one another.
⚡Harry Potter(Wizarding World)
💍Lord of the Rings(Middle-earth)
⚔️Star Wars(A Galaxy Far Away)
🖖Star Trek(The Final Frontier)
01
What do you put on when you need cheering up? Nobody is brave about this one.
02
How deep do you go into something you love? There is no shallow end here, only different deep ends.
03
What do you and your friends actually argue about? Every fandom has one argument it has been having for years.
04
How do you feel about a room full of strangers? Every one of these comes with a very big room.
05
Where would you rather spend a week? Pick on instinct rather than on budget.
06
What do you believe about people, mostly? All four of these stories have an answer, and they disagree.
07
What is actually on your shelf? Look over at it before you answer.
08
What do you actually want from a story? Eight questions in, this is the one that picks your fandom.
Membership Confirmed Your Fandom Is…
Four of the largest communities on the planet, and four completely different reasons to belong to one. Here is yours, what it would give you, and the argument you would be having within a week.
Harry Potter
You belong to the fandom that is really about comfort. Hogwarts works on people because it is a place rather than a plot, and the pull is not the wizard war so much as the corridors, the food, the weather and the sense that somebody is expecting you.
- You are drawn to belonging, which is why this fandom sorted itself into houses within about five minutes and has never stopped.
- This is the most social of the four, and the one most likely to know which type every single person in your life would be.
- The books are built to be reread rather than analysed, and rereading is exactly what you do with things you love.
- The new HBO series is bringing the whole thing back one book at a time, which means the arguments are about to start all over again.
Lord of the Rings
You belong to the deepest fandom on this list, the one where somebody has always read further than you and is quietly delighted to say so. Middle-earth rewards patience more than any other world in popular culture.
- You like the sense that the story you are reading is only the visible part of something enormous, which is precisely how Tolkien built it.
- This fandom takes adaptation seriously to a degree that other fandoms find slightly alarming, and it has good reasons for that.
- Your favourite thing about the books is probably the bit that is not action at all, which is the walking, the songs and the long goodbyes.
- Nobody here thinks heroism belongs to the powerful, and the whole story exists to make that argument.
Star Wars
You belong to the loudest and largest tent of the four, the one where three generations are all watching the same thing and none of them agree about any of it. That disagreement is not a flaw in this fandom, it is the main activity.
- You want something you can share with absolutely everybody, from a six year old to a grandparent, and this is the only one on the list that really does that.
- Nobody argues like Star Wars fans argue, and the argument has been running since roughly 1980 with no sign of resolution.
- The pull here is sensory before it is narrative, since it is the sound design, the score and the look of a used and dented galaxy.
- You would be first in the queue, in costume, with strong opinions and a genuinely good time.
Star Trek
You belong to the thinking fandom, the one that turns up for the argument rather than the explosion. Trek has always been a series of ethical problems in space, and the people who love it love being asked what they would have done.
- You are an optimist in a way that is currently unfashionable, and this is the only major franchise still willing to say the future might be better.
- The best episodes are the ones where nobody fires anything, which is a sentence that makes perfect sense to this fandom and to nobody else.
- Starfleet Academy brought the franchise back to a classroom in 2026, which is appropriate, because Trek has always been a bit of a seminar.
- You would want the conversation afterwards more than the episode itself, and here you will always find somebody willing to have it.
4 Monica Geller: Anya Taylor-Joy
Anya Taylor-Joy is one of the most sought-after young actors of this generation. Rising to fame in The Queen's Gambit, one of the greatest miniseries masterpieces of the 21st century, then the movie The Menu, and now most recently starring in the Apple TV series Lucky, she has taken on diverse characters. While many have a certain sex appeal, Monica, originally played by Courteney Cox, is more upright. But Taylor-Joy is the type of actor you know could handle any type of character that's thrown at her.
This version of Monica might have to change slightly, but we could see it working. She could be a cute pairing with Radcliffe, Astin, or Keery, and I could see Eisenberg as her annoying older brother. It would be a role out of Taylor-Joy's usual darker, more intense shows and movies, but she could be convincing as the uptight, neat-freak, hard-working chef.
Honorable mentions: Hailee Steinfeld (she has the same adorably magnetic quality); Millie Bobby Brown (she has a sweet innocence about her like Monica); Ayo Edebiri (she'd taps into Monica's sarcastic side); Chase Infiniti (she has the same classic beauty and tremendous acting talent); Maude Apatow (she's an up-and-comer whose Euphoria character you could imagine as being a younger Monica).
5 Joey Tribbiani: Dave Franco
Matt LeBlanc beautifully portrayed the handsome but goofy and not very academically intelligent friend. This is a character type Dave Franco knows all too well and could play to a T. He leaned into the comedy angle in movies like Superbad and the Now You See Me films, as well as in shows like The Afterparty and The Studio, the latter of which he played an embellished version of himself.
While Franco is already 40, his boyish face would fit with a more mature version of the character. He could easily replicate Joey's doe-eyed look, womanizing ways, and adorably naïve personality.
Honorable mentions: Zac Efron (he fits the hunky persona and knows comedy); Timothée Chalamet (he's a versatile young actor who can take on any role); Robbie Amell (he's dabbled in comedy with Upload, showing he can handle goofy, macho roles).
6 Phoebe Buffay: Haley Lu Richardson
It's tough to imagine anyone but Lisa Kudrow embodying Phoebe. But when considering the younger generation of actors, Haley Lu Richardson is easy to picture in a boho outfit, playing her guitar in the coffee shop, singing about her smelly cat, and playing up the eccentric, kooky personality.
Richardson has shown her range in roles like The White Lotus, one of the most perfect HBO shows of the last 15 years, where she played a young assistant trying to find herself. She more recently appeared in the Peacock series Ponies as a confident and rebellious wife of a CIA agent in the '70s. There's no doubt she'd tackle Phoebe with a modern 21st-century twist.
Honorable mentions: Elle Fanning (she's one of the most versatile young actors of this generation); Sadie Sink (the sarcastic slant of Max in Stranger Things would be perfect for the character); Hunter Schafer (her nuanced performance in Euphoria included some comedy as well); Emma Myers (her upbeat character in Wednesday has hints of Phoebe).
7 Gunther: Suraj Sharma
The late James Michael Tyler quietly played Gunther, the manager of Central Perk who not-so-secretly pined for Rachel. He quietly puts up with the antics of the group and keeps their favorite couch perpetually reserved so it's always available to them when they want it. For a time, he was Rachel's boss when she worked there as a waitress.
Suraj Sharma feels like a good actor for this role, perhaps because of his role as Sid in the short-lived How I Met Your Mother spin-off, How I Met Your Father. On that show, he's a member of the core group who happens to own a bar. Even though he's part of the friend group, they often visit the bar while he's working. Beyond that, he could lend more personality to the role, since Tyler was mostly a background character with a few lines here and there. Sharma has great comedic timing, so even with a single line, he'd command attention and garner laughs.
Honorable mention: Reba McEntire (she would bring loads more comedy to the role with some good one-liners).
8 Jacob Elordi: Richard Burke
For some time, Monica dated the handsome Richard, played by the handsome Tom Selleck. He was tall, suave, wealthy, and much older. Unsurprisingly, Chandler was threatened by Richard when he felt like the old beau might return to Monica's life. In this generation, I could easily see Jacob Elordi playing Richard. He's tall and handsome as well, and while young, there's no reason Richard couldn't be switched to a young, successful businessman instead of an older one.
Given the shift to female empowerment nowadays, it wouldn't be out of the ordinary to have Monica dating a younger man and swapping the story angle. Elordi, for his part, knows how to play the prince charming type, having done so in projects like The Kissing Booth and Wuthering Heights.
Honorable mentions: Liam Hemsworth (has the same classic handsome look); Robert Pattinson (his characters often have an air of mystery about them); Glen Powell (his smile lights a room, and he'd easily fit as the ex that makes Chandler jealous).
9 Isabela Merced: Janice Hosenstein
Aside from Monica, Chandler had one other major girlfriend through the show's run. Janice (Maggie Wheeler) is best known for her distinct accent, loud personality, bold clothing choices, and obnoxious cries of, "Oh my god!" Isabela Merced is an up-and-coming young actor who is best known for her role in The Last of Us. But her experience from Nickelodeon shows, as well as more serious ones like in Alien: Romulus, suggest this could be a fun role to show her comedic side, too.
Janice appears in multiple seasons of Friends, coming back into Chandler's life more than once. Sometimes, the group just runs into her in various scenarios. Merced proved in Season 2 of The Last of Us that she could dominate scenes. That's something Wheeler did whenever the camera was on her as Janice, oozing main character energy even though she wasn't one.
Honorable mentions: Joey King (her range is tremendous, and though she mostly does serious roles, she'd ace this one); Melissa Rauch (she perfected the nasally, squeaky voice for Bernadette on The Big Bang Theory).
10 Paul Rudd: Mike Hannigan
I mean, could anyone else possibly play Mike, Phoebe's long-term boyfriend and eventual husband, other than Paul Rudd himself? Sure, decades have passed since he last played the role, but as many joke, Rudd doesn't seem to age. He still looks like he did back then, so it would be hilarious to have Rudd return in this same role.
The age difference might be a little unsettling, depending on who's playing Phoebe, but would it really be any different than when Selleck played the older Richard dating Monica? Rudd has such a boyish charm that he'd slink so easily back into the role that everyone would forget he's pushing 60 and totally believe that Phoebe has fallen head over heels for the weirdly wonderful pianist and former lawyer.
Friends
- Release Date
- 1994 - 2004-00-00
- Network
- NBC
- Showrunner
- Marta Kauffman
- Directors
- Kevin S. Bright, Gary Halvorson, Michael Lembeck, James Burrows, Gail Mancuso, Peter Bonerz, David Schwimmer, Robby Benson, Shelley Jensen, Terry Hughes, Dana De Vally Piazza, Alan Myerson, Pamela Fryman, Steve Zuckerman, Thomas Schlamme, Roger Christiansen, Sheldon Epps, Arlene Sanford, David Steinberg, Joe Regalbuto, Mary Kay Place, Paul Lazarus, Sam Simon, Todd Holland
KioskNews shows a cleaned-up reading view extracted from the publisher’s page — the original always lives on their site, not ours.