Courteney Cox Was Supposed to Play Someone Else on 'Friends'

All Friends fans know and love Courteney Cox in her performance as Monica Geller—but the actress almost took on a completely different role in the series.

One of the show's creators, Marta Kauffman, revealed to Rolling Stone that Cox was not always slated for her funny, lovable, and slightly neurotic character.

"We thought Courteney Cox might be Rachel," Kauffman said. "She’s the one who said, 'No, I should be Monica.'"

“Matthew Perry was one of the first names on our list, but he was doing another show at the time, so we made an offer to another actor, who thankfully turned it down, and we got back to Matthew," the producer added about the casting of the actor behind Chandler Bing, a.k.a. Monica's on-screen husband.

While some characters were not always played by the actors we have come to know and love, there's one character who was created for a specific actor.

“David Schwimmer had auditioned (for us) the year before for another pilot, and he was in our heads when we wrote Ross — his voice, the hangdog thing,” the producer added about the creation of Monica's brother, Ross Geller.

It's hard to imagine the fan-favorite characters played by anyone else, but this insight shows just how much goes on behind the scenes of a hit show that audiences do not see.