Friends star Jane Sibbett, who played Ross’s (David Schwimmer) ex-wife Carol Willick on the show, has said she once received abuse after starring in a lesbian wedding scene on the show.
Sibbett’s character came out as gay in the sitcom following her affair with future wife Susan, who the character married in 1996. Following the wedding, Sibbett said she faced a lot of vitriol over her character’s sexiality.
She said: “I would say there was 95% support but once I had flown to Canada to shoot a Disney movie and a child was yelling at me out of a school window. He was shouting, ‘Go home, American f*g’ and I just went, ‘Wow, wrong on so many levels dude. Come down here and have a conversation with me’.
“Then I had a woman from my old church call me up… and proceeded to tell me that I was going to burn in hell.”
Sibbett went on to explain that even her father refused to watch the show, which is currently celebrating its 30th anniversary, after the scene was aired.
She continued: “It caused stress in my own family. We had a big situation with my father who wouldn’t watch the show. Thankfully he came around to it in the end.
“It was heartbreaking that he wouldn’t watch it. He would hold a bible study group at the time it aired to ensure his friends wouldn’t see it either. It took my godfather writing a letter to him saying how proud he was of me for the wedding scene that cracked it for my father.”
