Photo by: Chris Haston/NBCNBCU Photo Bank(HOLLYWOOD) — So far, in the past year, we’ve gotten reboots of Queer Eye, Murphy Brown and Roseanne, a Mad About You revival is coming soon, and the cast of Frasier is mulling bringing their show back. But you can stop asking for a reboot of Friends, co-creator Marta Kaufman tells Rolling Stone. It’s not happening.
“There are several reasons” why the show won’t return, she explains. “One, the show is about a time in your life when your friends are your family. It’s not that time anymore. All we’d be doing is putting those six actors back together, but the heart of the show would be gone. Two, I don’t know what good it does us. The show is doing just fine — people love it.”
Kaufman is referring to the fact that millennials and Generation-Z’ers — including her teenage daughters — are now bingeing the show thanks to its run on Netflix.
That’s why she says a reboot “could only disappoint,” and refers to the show’s famous episode naming convention — “The One Where…” — by joking a reboot would be called “The One Where Everyone’s Disappointed.”
Of course, Kaufman understands the appeal of the sitcom that made us all pals with Ross, Monica, Chandler, Phoebe and Rachel, and made their unrealistically huge New York City apartments fans’ home away from home.
“It’s a comfort-food show,” Kaufman admits. “These are trying times, and certain people want the comfort food rather than the difficult, mean-spirited kind of show. It’s warm, it’s cozy, [the characters] love each other. What’s not to love about that?”
Copyright © 2019, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.