Twenty-five years ago this month, Friends premiered on NBC, making Jennifer Aniston an instant household name. But in the months before the show debuted, it wasn’t at all clear that Jennifer, now 50, would get the part of Rachel Green. In fact, her agent told her she had to lose 30 pounds or she would lose her shot at the role of a lifetime.
The weight loss request was discussed in a new book, Generation Friends: An Inside Look at the Show That Defined a Television Era. Before the hit show, Jennifer’s resume included the Ferris Bueller TV show and a failed Fox sitcom, Molloy. She was still looking for her big, breakout hit.
“She had to lose thirty pounds if she wanted to stay in Hollywood,” author Saul Austerlitz wrote. “Los Angeles was a tough place to be an actress — it was a tough place to be a woman — and Jennifer Aniston’s agent was reluctantly leveling with her.”
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Jennifer had gotten a callback and was ordered to wear a leotard. “This’ll blow it for me,” she told her agent, who gave her the dieting advice.
Photo credit: Bei/Shutterstock
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“Aniston was hardly fat — everyone could see she was beautiful — but as the show she would one day become indelibly associated with later made a point of noting, the camera added ten pounds,” the author wrote.
Photo credit: Globe Photos/Mediapunch/Shutterstock
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In a 1996 interview with
Rolling Stone, Jennifer talked about what it was like to be told she had to lose weight by her agent. She said it helped her stop eating unhealthy foods, like mayonnaise sandwiches, which she called “the most delicious thing in the world.”
Photo credit: INSTARImages
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“My agent gave it to me straight,” she said at the time. “Nicest thing he ever did…. The disgusting thing of Hollywood — I wasn’t getting lots of jobs ’cause I was too heavy.”
Photo credit: INSTARImages
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Eventually she was cast as Rachel and her life was changed forever.
Photo credit: INSTARImages
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Almost three decades later, Jennifer has remained close to her
Friends costars, especially
Courteney Cox and
Lisa Kudrow.
Photo credit: Globe Photos/Mediapunch/Shutterstock
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Jennifer had gotten a callback and was ordered to wear a leotard. “This’ll blow it for me,” she told her agent, who gave her the dieting advice.
Photo credit: Bei/Shutterstock
“Aniston was hardly fat — everyone could see she was beautiful — but as the show she would one day become indelibly associated with later made a point of noting, the camera added ten pounds,” the author wrote.
Photo credit: Globe Photos/Mediapunch/Shutterstock
In a 1996 interview with
Rolling Stone, Jennifer talked about what it was like to be told she had to lose weight by her agent. She said it helped her stop eating unhealthy foods, like mayonnaise sandwiches, which she called “the most delicious thing in the world.”
Photo credit: INSTARImages
“My agent gave it to me straight,” she said at the time. “Nicest thing he ever did…. The disgusting thing of Hollywood — I wasn’t getting lots of jobs ’cause I was too heavy.”
Photo credit: INSTARImages
Eventually she was cast as Rachel and her life was changed forever.
Photo credit: INSTARImages
Almost three decades later, Jennifer has remained close to her
Friends costars, especially
Courteney Cox and
Lisa Kudrow.
Photo credit: Globe Photos/Mediapunch/Shutterstock
