Jerry Seinfeld thew a little shade at “Friends” during at the 2026 Netflix Is a Joke Festival, claiming the show was inspired by his own iconic sitcom, “Seinfeld.”
The comedian made the comment during his set at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles Tuesday during a bit in which he asked the audience to guess what his all-time favorite show was, per the Hollywood Reporter.
When an audience member shouted out “Friends,” Seinfeld said he had a theory about the comedy starring Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, David Schwimmer, Matt LeBlanc and the late Matthew Perry.
Jerry Seinfeld (pictured here in October 2023) threw a little shade at “Friends” while performing at the Netflix Is a Joke Festival Tuesday. Getty Images for Good+Foundation
Seinfeld theorized that “Friends” copied “Seinfeld,” but used “good-looking people.” (The “Seinfeld” cast — including Michael Richards, Jason Alexander, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Seinfeld himself — is seen here in a promotional still.) NBCUniversal via Getty Images
“My show [‘Seinfled’] came on — ’89, ’90. ‘Friends’ came on a few years later,” he noted.
“I think NBC was watching my show and went, ‘Hey, this is working pretty well. Why don’t we try the same thing with good-looking people?’ And that was a pretty good idea,” he continued. “I think that kind of worked.”
“Seinfeld” — which starred the titular comedian as well as Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Michael Richards and Jason Alexander — premiered on NBC in 1989 and ran for nine seasons.
“Friends” debuted in 1994 and aired for 10 seasons on NBC.
“Friends” debuted five years after “Seinfeld” in 1994 and also aired on NBC. (The cast, pictured here, included Lisa Kudrow, the late Matthew Perry, Jennifer Aniston, David Schwimmer, Courteney Cox and Matt LeBlanc.) ©NBC/Courtesy Everett Collection
“Seinfeld” (a still of which is seen above) lasted nine seasons, while “Friends” was on the air for 10 seasons. NBCUniversal via Getty Images
Both shows revolved around a close group of friends living in New York City, though “Friends” was story and character-centric while “Seinfeld” was famously dubbed a “show about nothing” by Seinfeld himself and co-creator Larry David.
This isn’t the first time Seinfeld has taken credit for the success of “Friends.”
Kudrow told the Daily Beast in 2022 that Seinfeld once walked up to her at a party in the ’90s and told her “you’re welcome,” as “Friends” had been put on NBC’s schedule right after ratings juggernaut “Seinfeld.”
Both shows revolved around a close-knit group of friends living in New York City. (A still of “Friends” is seen here.) NBCUniversal via Getty Images
Kudrow (pictured here center in a still with her co-stars) revealed last month that the “Friends” cast still makes $20 million a year in residuals more than 20 years after the show ended. NBCUniversal via Getty Images
Last month, Kudrow revealed the “Friends” cast still gets a whopping $20 million a year from residuals, more than two decades after the hit sitcom came to an end in 2004.
But she noted in the same interview that their experience filming wasn’t always positive, and that “there was definitely mean stuff going on behind the scenes.”
“Don’t forget we were recording in front of a live audience of 400, and if you messed up one of these writers’ lines or it didn’t get the perfect response, they could be like, ‘Can’t the bitch f–king read? She’s not even trying. She f–ed up my line,’” she recalled to the Times of London.
Kudrow also claimed that the writers’ room, which was composed of mostly men, would “be up late discussing their sexual fantasies” about Aniston and Cox. She recalled the time as “intense.”