“Friends” Remake with an All Black Cast Ensemble

Friends Reunion wouldn’t be happening, but that doesn’t mean you have to stay up until midnight and worry about your WENUS (Weekly Estimated Net Usage Systems).

Okay, no more cliché jokes. Apparently, it is true that Sterling K. Brown, Uzo Aduba, Gabrielle Union & Co. enacted an episode of Friends “The One Where No One’s Ready” at a Zoom table read event called “Zoom Where it Happens” as a part of their social message of encouragement that more people should come out and vote on election day (November the 3rd).

Many fans of the legendary sitcom and of the updated actors were elated by the news of the program when Ryan Michelle Bathe revealed it to them via a post on Instagram on Monday. It was a follow-up post to her original promotional post of inviting people to visit the voting advocacy organization “When We All Vote.”

Bathe revealed the project which offered an all-black look of Friends with her being cast as Rachel, Sterling K Brown as Ross, Aduba as Phoebe, Aisha Hinds as Monica and Jeremy Pope as Chandler.

Joey was played by Kendrick Simpson who also narrated and hosted the event.

Cinthia Erivo started the table read, surprising everyone with her melodious recitation of Friends theme song-“I’ll be there for You.”

Brown and Bathe who are the real-life couple fittingly played the on-screen couple characters Ross and Rachel and were seen together in a zoom screen along with other actors who were in separate zoom screens. They enacted the famous episode of season 3 titled “The One Where No One’s Ready.” The new cast changed the jokes made on the episode which aired almost 24 years ago with clever improvisation that funnily represented today’s unprecedented times.

If you can remember the episode, it was the one where Ross tries to get everyone ready for the Black-Tie Benefit event at the museum. He then, of course, faces humorous obstacles which revolve around Monica’s melodrama over Richard, Joey and Chandler fighting over a chair, Phoebe’s dress being ruined and Rachel’s undecided-attitude over her dress.

One of the other clever improvisations was from Sterling K. Brown who changed one of Ross’s sarcastic dialogue at the end to “It’s starting to rain. That will make it easier for a black man to get a cab” adding a racial angle to an already existing complex problem.

Jeremy Pope also made an interesting improvisation in one of Chandler’s dialogue where he sarcastically references Winnie-the-pooh author A.A. Milne in his order for Joey to leave the chair on which he was sitting. Instead of mentioning A.A. Milne, Pope referenced a black actor Jordan Peele and said: “In the words of Jordan Peele, Get Out.”

After the event, the entire cast urged all the viewers to make sure they were voting in time and before they vote they must plan who to vote so that they can make a better choice for the future. In reference to Bathe’s earlier post, the entire cast seconded her wish that viewers do visit a non-profit voting advocacy organization called “When We All Vote.”

It was the second time that a comedy series was reimagined with a black cast, the previous one being “The Golden Girls” which involved Emmy winner Regina King, Alfre Woodard, Sanaa Lathan, and Tracee Ellis Ross.

The original NBC sitcom “Friends” starred Jennifer Aniston, Courtney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Mathew Perry, and David Schwimmer.

The iconic 90’s romantic comedy show had its fair share of criticism during its time that it lacked diversity in the production team, but the show is still loved all over the world because of its light-hearted situational comedy, interesting characterization, romance, and Mathew Perry’s sarcastic charisma.

Everleig is a Blog expert and has been working in the technology industry since 2003. As a technical expert, Everleig has written technical blogs, manuals, white papers, and reviews for many websites such as souted.uk.com

Source: Black Cast