The surprising reason Matthew Perry almost turned down Friends

Could we be any more surprised?! According to the actor himself, one major cast member on NBC’s hit sitcom Friends almost turned down the show.

When you think about Friends, it’s pretty hard to imagine anyone else playing one of the six iconic characters. The role of Phoebe Buffay was basically made for Lisa Kudrow, and no one can change my mind. Imagining anyone else singing “Smelly Cat” is just absurd. The same goes for the rest of the characters, who were so perfectly embodied by the actors who played them. As reported by Inquisitr a few years back, Matthew Perry almost missed out on playing Chandler Bing because of another acting commitment.

In a 2015 interview with Seth Meyers on Late Night, Perry spoke about how he was almost roped into portraying a baggage handler in a show called LAX 2194, which took place at the LAX airport in the year 2194. You can watch the full interview below.

The description Perry gives of LAX 2194 sounds like some film major’s fever dream, so it’s a good thing Perry ultimately chose to audition for a show called Friends Like Us, which later became Friends. Trying to imagine Friends without Chandler’s classic witty one-liners and sarcastic comments is nearly impossible, and the show definitely would have been different had the role gone to another actor.

So what ever happened to

LAX 2194

? According to

Screen Rant

, the pilot for the comedy never aired and it was axed before viewers even got to see it. Though that’s unfortunate, it definitely worked out in the long run for Perry.

Thank goodness Perry didn’t end up portraying a baggage handler!

This article was originally published on Floor8 and is written by Mae Harrington O’Neill.