Ranking the ‘Friends’ Reunion Guest Appearances, From Lady Gaga to Tom Selleck

By modeling Ross’ infamous leather pants during the quick fashion show of famous “Friends” looks, Crawford reminded the audience that she is someone who seems like she should have guest starred on “Friends” when it was in its original run. During the 1990s, she was one of the most sought-after supermodels, but she was also making her way on screen, from hosting “House of Style” on MTV to starring in the feature film “Fair Game.” Although the show had other models-slash-actors guest star (Brooke Shields, Elle Macpherson), this is the closest Crawford came.

The model-actor-singer took part in the fashion show as well, modeling two designs: Rachel’s Little Bo Peep-inspired bridesmaid dress from the Season 2 finale and the Holiday Armadillo that Ross wore to teach his son about Hanukkah in Season 7. She was a great sport, most notably because that latter costume has a partial face mask, so anyone, really, could have been in it. There were so many pieces to this special, it felt like this one — and Delevingne — got a bit short-changed. Is she a “Friends” fan, or was this just another modeling gig for her? Maybe she’ll answer on social media because the actual special didn’t explain.

Kudrow was certainly thrilled to see Bieber show up in Ross’ Spudnik costume from “The One With the Halloween Party” for the fashion show. (She may have the loudest laugh of the cast, but she also has the loudest excited voice.) But the truly surreal moment of seeing the pop star come out on stage in a huge potato costume with a colander on his head was a bit drawn out. Perhaps he just had a hard time moving in that thing, but he certainly seemed to milk his time on the runway, which took away precious seconds we could have been spending with the stars of the show we were there to see reunite. His appearance was made more memorable by James Corden saying he managed to make the costume “look cool” when earlier in the special Schwimmer worried about how he looked in the getup, especially around his acting idol Sean Penn, who guest starred in the Season 8 Halloween episode. Still, the whole fashion show felt unnecessary when the special already had so much else going on.

This may be a bit of a cheat since technically Tyler, who played Central Perk employee Gunther, wasn’t on stage with the rest of the cast. (He joined the interview section of the special remotely, via Zoom.) But we would never overlook the unofficial seventh friend! Unfortunately, it felt like the show did, as he barely got to say a few words about his decade on the sitcom.

While every other performer who made an in-person appearance on the reunion special got to actually perform in some capacity, Gould and Pickles only sat in the socially distanced audience during Corden’s interview with the six core cast members. They got the mic for a moment to tell a lovely story about working with the younger actors, but we’d be lying if we didn’t say we wanted more from Jack and Judy Geller. It felt like the special underrepresented just how integral they were to the show’s success. (Pickles was even one of its Emmy nominees.)

In the fifth season finale, Lennon played a casino worker who had hands that Joey thought were identical to his own. During the reunion special, LeBlanc was asked to select his hand twin from a lineup, looking only at hands, of course. After correctly guessing (Lennon may have lead him there by raising his right hand at one point), Lennon popped out from behind a curtain dressed in his costume from the show. It was a fun moment, but he, too, seemed under-used, only waving at the cast before ducking back behind the curtain.

Selleck played Monica’s boyfriend Richard (who also happened to be one of her father’s closest friends) in the second season of the sitcom. He then later appeared at the end of the sixth season, as a potential spoiler to Monica and Chandler’s engagement. Although there can’t be anyone in the audience who wishes she had ended up with him instead, it was still nice to see the veteran actor celebrate a rare comedy role by coming back to be a part of the trivia game. His appearance came with a little extra comedy when he posed the question of what Chandler’s job was to the cast, which gave Aniston another chance to yell, “Transponster!”

Hankin played Monica and Rachel’s downstairs neighbor, Mr. Heckles, in the first two seasons (and then in the third season flashback episode). The character was perpetually grumpy and also always in a bathrobe, so it only seemed fitting that when Hankin appeared during the “Friends” reunion he came in as his iconic character. Heard first as an audio clue to the trivia game the six core cast members were playing, Hankin then strolled through the apartment door as if nary a minute had passed since we all saw him last. The commitment to the character, all of these years later, is what puts him high on this list.

There were a lot of long-running jokes on “Friends,” from “Smelly Cat” to Joey’s pickup line catchphrase of “How you doin’?” to how Janice would just constantly pop up and instill fear in Chandler when he least expected it. Similarly, there were also a lot of seemingly one-off appearances that turned into returning guest star moments, including Mike Hagerty’s Mr. Treeger. One early (third season) element that seemed ripe for both was when Ross hired a barbershop quartet to remind Rachel of her “loyal, loving boyfriend” (him) while she was working late with an attractive new co-worker. (That group also performed at the end of the episode when Monica wanted to send a pointed message to her own co-worker, with whom she had a brief fling.) For reasons unknown, the musical foursome only appeared once in the show — until now. Original trio Amick Byram, Josef Powell and Dick Wells returned to Stage 24 and were joined by Guy Maeda to complete the quartet. This time they serenaded Aniston (and the whole cast) during the trivia game. It was perhaps the most unexpected moment, but they were perfectly in tune and that tune still slaps.

There really could have been no other entrance than the one Wheeler gave, yelling, “Oh my God!” from off-camera, just before she stepped outside to surprise the cast during their interview with Corden. The group had been talking about who on the set had the loudest laugh, and while out of the six of them the answer may have been Kudrow, when considering recurring players, the honor (?) had to go to Wheeler. She joined the interview to tell the story about creating that laugh, sharing that she did it because she knew she’d break because of how funny her scene partner Perry was, but at least if she made it part of the character it wouldn’t ruin the take. With behind-the-scenes tidbits like that, she really gave the people what they wanted.

The lone major musical moment of the reunion turned very emotional when Lady Gaga joined Kudrow on the recreated Central Perk set to perform “Smelly Cat.” Slightly reminiscent of when Chrissie Hynde (who co-wrote the song) appeared in Season 2, Kudrow and Gaga sat on the iconic orange couch and strummed the bars, with Gaga not holding anything back vocally. They were also joined by a gospel choir (also reminiscent of a second season moment: when Phoebe worked with a record producer to record her best-known song, only to have surprise backup singers in the booth behind her). After the song Gaga also took a second to thank Kudrow for “being the person for all of us … that was the different one, or the one that was really herself.”