Friends was and is a blessing to so many people around the world. And so was Matthew Perry.

The alchemy of brilliant writing, a stellar cast, voice-of-a-generation twentysomethings, and hilarity and emotionality in abundance, made it a wonderful series in 1994 — and unbeknown to all of us, were the ingredients to continue to impact generations almost 30 years after that. As the head of comedy development at Warner Bros. Television at that time, it’s definitely a shining star in my career.

Casting the six Friends, along with creators Marta Kauffman, David Crane and Kevin Bright, was challenging. They all had to be “stars.” The chemistry had to be believable. You just had to love them. And no one was more elusive than Chandler.

We had happily cast David Schwimmer (Ross), Lisa Kudrow (Phoebe), Courteney Cox (Monica) and Matt LeBlanc (Joey), and we had two roles to go just days before we started production on the pilot.