HBO would prepare an extremely important hit for the launch of the HBO Max service, a reunion of the actors from the series Friends to be transformed into a special one-hour episode that would be broadcast on the platform. HBO and those from Warner Bros would have negotiated for several months with the main actors of the Friends series to appear in this special episode, and in the end they would be very close to reaching an agreement for its production in 2020.
HBO would like to launch the HBO Max platform with something really special, so that they would be ready to pay 20 million dollars only to the actors who will reappear in this special episode of the reunion. Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, David Schwimmer, Matt LeBlanc and Matthew Perry have reportedly agreed to receive between $3 and $4 million to appear in this special episode of Friends, and this is very big news for the platform .
HBO wants to Produce a new SPECIAL Episode of Friends in 2020
HBO will have all episodes of the Friends series available when HBO Max launches, so this special reunion episode will be something that will definitely attract more people to the platform. HBO is willing to pay a very large amount of money to create this special episode, much like Netflix pays for its comedy creations, but since it spends 425 million dollars on the entire series of Friends, what does a few tens of millions matter? ?
“A few months after its 25th anniversary, the cast of the iconic comedy series Friends is expected to reunite for an unscripted reunion special. It will help launch the upcoming HBO Max streaming platform. No one has commented, but we've heard that each of the six stars will be paid between $3 million and $4 million to appear in the special episode.”
HBO wants to launch the HBO Max platform in the spring of this year, but that special one-hour episode probably won't be ready for release that quickly since the contracts haven't been signed yet. Considering the way the negotiations have unfolded so far, it is very possible that HBO will start production only in the spring, and release the episode in the summer or fall, depending on how the filming will go.
HBO is determined to turn HBO Max into a seriously competitive platform for Netflix, and the investment it makes for Friends could turn out to be exactly what the platform needs to begin with.
