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How to Visit the “Friends Studio Tour” in LA with the Warner Bros Hollywood Tour

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Looking for a Friends studio tour or Friends set tour to do in LA? Read on for a guide on how to visit some of the most iconic and famous sets from Friends with one of the best studio tours in LA.

We here are GeekTrippers are obsessed with finding the best filming locations around the world, and as avid Friends fans, one of our biggest bucket list items has been visiting the Friends set in real life!

We got to fulfill this dream a few years ago in LA, and again recently with a return to the (newly improved) version of the tour that includes way more sets and fun photo opps, including the original Friends fountain.

For movie and TV lovers, Los Angeles offers several studio tours that bring you right into the action so you can personally witness where the magic of film and television come alive.

In this post, we’ll share with you how you can tour the Friends set in LA (sort of) and show you the wonders of the Warner Bros Studio Tour in Burbank.

IMPORTANT: If visiting the Friends set and Warner Bros Studio Tour is important to you, make SURE you book your tour in advance online . This attraction is wildly popular and we almost missed out on going because we procrastinated. There are very limited tickets available on-site, so buying in advance these days is 100% the way to go. Check ticket price and availability here.

How to Tour the Friends Set and Studio in LA

Unfortunately, there is no Friends Studio Tour in LA that will allow you to visit all your favourite Friends sets from the show (i.e. every apartment).

The closest thing to a Friends set tour where you can visit Monica and Rachel’s apartment set, along with Joey and Chandler’s apartment set, Ross’ apartment set and even the Central Perk set all in one go is the FRIENDS Experience , which doesn’t have any stops in Los Angeles.

When people talk about doing the Friends studio tour in LA though, what they are really talking about the Warner Bros Studio Hollywood Tour in Burbank, which is not a 100% Friends themed set tour, but rather a studio tour that takes you to various sets and backlots including ones seen in Friends.

If you love TV, this is a must-do experience, with wonderfully familiar sets from Friends, Gilmore Girls, Pretty Little Liars, and more.

As of 2021 though, there is WAY more to offer for Friends fans, including a full-on “Central Perk Café” and Friends boutique, where you can grab a coffee amidst recreated apartment sets.

Warner Bros Studio Tour Hollywood: Details

The Warner Bros Studio Tour is located in Burbank and tickets start at $69 per person.

The tour lasts approximately 3 hours total (1 hour guided, 2 hours self guided), and is capped at 12 people per tour to ensure a more personal experience.

Be sure to book your tour  online in advance, as time slots can get filled quickly.

We opted for the cost-effective Studio Tour (as opposed to the pricier Deluxe tour), and it was more than enough for us! 

Tours are offered from 8:15am-4:00pm Monday-Friday.

Our Experience Touring the Friends Studio/Set at the Warner Bros Hollywood Studio Tour

Warning: spoilers ahead! I’ll be going into detail about where they brought us and what we saw on the tour, so you better look away if you’re a fan of surprises! The photos and experience below are from our most recent in visit in 2022.

1. Getting to the Warner Brothers Studio Lot

The address for the Warner Bros Studio Tour in Hollywood is 3400 Warner Blvd. Burbank, CA 91505.

This is the address you would put into a rideshare app or taxi, but there is also covered parking available here at the Tour Center for $15 per vehicle.

2. The Warner Bros Studio Tour Hollywood Welcome Center

Here, you’ll find a full-service Starbucks where you can grab a drink by the Tri-Wizard Cup from Harry Potter, as well as the Warner Bros. Studio Store, which is filled with amazing merch from across fandoms.

The tour will bring you back into the store at the end, so don’t worry about buying all your souvenirs now. It’s highly recommended you buy your ticket online because day-of tickets are highly limited, and the experience is just way smoother if you have your tickets already.

3. Warner Bros Storytelling Showcase

After you show your tickets, your tour begins with a storytelling showcase that explores the century-long history of Warner Bros through old photos and displays.

While this is a more general showcase area, there are some fun props for Friends fans, like one of Phoebe’s guitars:

4. The Warner Bros Hollywood Studio Tour Pre-Show 

After you go through the Storytelling showcase, you are brought into a nice waiting area that has decorated with international posters from famous Warner Bros movies.

From here, you are brought into a theatre for a pre-show introduction to Warner Bros, featuring clips from the myriad of films and shows that they have produced.

This little film does an awesome job of pumping you up for the tour! After this, you will meet your tour guide and will then be sent on your way.

5. Warner Bros Backlot Tour

After the intro film, you are loaded onto the giant golf carts and sent off to explore some backlots. Since the studio is a working one, which specific backlots you see will depend on what is currently in use for filming.

The tour guides here are really knowledgable and fun, and tend to start the tour by asking which Warner Bros movies/shows you like.

Don’t be shy here, because they will tailor the tour based on your interests, so if your goal is to see as many Friends filming locations as possible, they will help point them out!

As well as Midwest Street, which is supposedly one of the most used sets in Hollywood.

Most notably, it has appeared as Star’s Hollow from Gilmore Girls, and Rosewood from Pretty Little Liars. While here, we got off the carts to explore a bit on foot, taking time for lots of photos at the Star’s Hollow gazebo:

We then stopped off to see the interior of a house set, which happened to be the house where Monica and Rachel’s  prom video  was shot. Can’t you picture sad Ross on those stairs?!

We also went past Stage 24, which is the Friends stage. Unfortunately, it was in use, so not open to visitors!

Stage 48: Script to Screen

After the backlot tour, you will be brought to Stage 48, which is home to an exciting museum-esque display of sets, costumes, and props, arranged in a sort of way that mimics the production process, from initial scriptwriting all the way to special effects at the end.

The best part is that this stage is super interactive, with plenty of staff photographers scattered around to help you get the perfect photo.

You’ll find the real Central Perk set here, which is so much smaller in real life than it looks on TV.

There were also a few sets from the Big Bang Theory.

And a really fun interactive area where you can see some special effects at work.

Central Perk Café and Friends Boutique

At the end of the Stage 48 experience, you are brought to the new Central Perk Café and Friends Boutique.

If your main goal for doing the tour is seeing sets from Friends in real life, then THIS is your place to shine.

There’s of course the cafe itself, which serves a variety of coffee/deli treats, some of which are named after the Friends themselves, or based on the show (e.g. Rachel’s English Trifle, luckily without any meat).

We’d advise 1000% to get your coffee for here, rather than to go, because you have your pick at fun places to sip and marvel at the MANY Friends easter eggs scattered around the cafe/boutique.

You can sit and have a drink at “Central Perk”:

Grab a seat at Monica & Rachel’s kitchen table or sofa:

Or enjoy some chill time on one of Joey and Chandler’s BarcaLoungers, before spending your life savings around the gift shop, where every single item is Friends themed. We couldn’t resist going home with a Central Perk mug. It just had to be done.

Action and Magic Made Here

After you’ve spent all your money, you step outside and take a short golf cart shuttle over to the final part of the tour, which is called “Action and Magic Made Here”.

During our visit, this part of the tour was clearly divided into two sections: the world of DC and the world of Harry Potter.

The DC section had lots of cool costumes and props from the more recent DC movies, including old Batmobiles and outfits from the Justice League & Suicide Squad.

The Harry Potter & Fantastic Beasts section had a few different rooms, including a Potions classroom, Herbology classroom, and the interior of Newt’s briefcase.

This part of the tour concludes with a display of the awards Warner Bros has won, and you get to take a photo with your own real life Oscar if you so wish!

Warner Bros. Studio Store

The final stop was of course the gift shop, where you could find a variety of fun souvenirs from across fandoms.

If you’re not sick of photos just yet, there are also some unique costumes on display! During our visit, we got to see some more costumes from the DC Universe, like suits from Grant Gustin’s Flash and Stephen Amell’s Arrow.

How to Visit the Friends Set in Real Life

So, to recap, if your goal is to explore the sets from Friends in real life, you either have to wait for a travelling exhibition like FriendsFest, or you should go to LA and book the Warner Bros Hollywood Studio Tour so you can see the Central Perk set, Friends fountain, and other recreated sets at the Central Perk Café and Friends Boutique.

We hope you enjoyed this guide to doing a Friends set tour. Let us know in the comments if you have any more questions!

GeekTrippers Team

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Warner Bros.' Famous Studio Tour Just Reopened With New 'Friends' Experiences

Now Friends fans can eat Rachel's infamous trifle, sip character-themed coffee, and shop exclusive merchandise on the Warner Bros.' Studio Tour.

Now you can get a true taste of Friends at the Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood . The fan experience — which takes place on the actual working Warner Bros. lot in Burbank where the NBC sitcom was originally shot — reopened on Saturday, debuting an expanded Central Perk Café and Friends boutique .

As part of the "Stage 48: Script to Screen" stop on the tour, visitors can now dine on Friends -inspired items, including the infamous English trifle that Jennifer Aniston's character, Rachel Green, made for Thanksgiving. Yes, the one where she accidentally blended a traditional trifle with a shepherd's pie after her cookbook pages got stuck together. (Don't worry, the version served here doesn't have any meat mixed up with the sweet and savory flavors.)

Also on the menu are Central Perk's own cupcakes, New York-style cheesecake (unlike when Rachel and Chandler had to scoop the one from Mama's Little Bakery off the floor, you can eat this off a plate!), and NYC deli favorites like corned beef melts and pizza wedges. There's also a line of drinks inspired by the characters , made with a Central Perk special blend — choose from a matcha latte called The Rachel, a classic flat white called The Ross, a caramel coconut latte called The Chandler, a cookies-and-cream ice blend called The Phoebe, and a mango cold brew tea called The Joey.

All the items can be enjoyed on recreated sets featuring Central Perk, Joey and Chandler's apartment, Monica's apartment, and Greenwich Village. Costumes from the show are also on display. Then cap off the experience by shopping at the Friends boutique with exclusive products not available anywhere else, including kitchen and dining ware.

Friends fans can currently only access the tour and experiences on weekends, but it will expand to five days a week (Thursday through Monday) starting July 15.

The tour also includes other new and expanded features within the Warner Bros. family of entertainment, like a "Storytelling Showcase" documenting the almost-century of Warner Bros. and an "Action and Magic Made Here" exhibit with elements of the DC Universe and Harry Potter films.

Sheldon's apartment from The Big Bang Theory , a Batmobile from Tim Burton's original "Batman," costumes from "Suicide Squad," Harry Potter's recreated cupboard under the stairs, and the late Chadwick Boseman's jersey from "42" are also seen on the tour.

Watch: ‘Friends’ and the Central Perk Café Gets Expanded Presence in New WB Studio Tour

Hang out at Central Perk or Monica and Rachel’s apartment.

With the new Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood’s grand reopening this weekend, we were invited to check out the new additions that the studio added as part of a media preview. While the new tour includes several additions, in this article, we are focusing on the Central Perk set from Friends at Stage 48. Previously, this location shared the space with the studio gift shop. However, now that the gift shop has been moved to the arrival area when you first check in for the tour, the entire space is devoted to Friends with plenty of seating and a healthy dose of 90s color.

Unlike other parts of the tour which are designed to keep you moving at a certain pace, the Friends apartment and coffee shop has no time limit, so you can hang out at Central Perk, Monica and Rachel’s apartment, or sit in Joey and Chandler’s reclining chairs. Of course, the added benefit of having fans stay awhile is they will be able to check out the exclusive Friends merchandise which is all around you as you drink your coffee or talk about one of your favorite shows.

While I think the tour would be even better if they actually recreated the sets so fans could feel like they were really drinking at Central Perk, or sitting inside one of the apartments, WB was clearly limited by space. They definitely maxed out the location while still making it so a lot of fans can share the experience

RELATED: Watch: WB Studio Tour in Hollywood Adds DC Universe and Harry Potter Props, Costumes, and Memorable Photo Opportunities

Check out the video I shot as I walked in to the location and below are a few photos I took.

The updated Warner Bros.Studio Tour will be open on weekends, from June 26 through July 11, with the Tour also being open on July 5. From July 15, the Studio Tour will operate 5 days a week and remain closed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Tours will depart from 9:00 AM to 3:00 PM with departures every 30 minutes. Tickets are available online for $69 for adults (ages 11 and up) and $59 for children ages 5 to 10 at wbstudiotour.com (advanced reservations will be required). Additionally, Southern California residents are eligible for a special rate of $57 on weekdays only, through September 30, 2021.

*Clap, clap, clap, clap.*

The Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood is back and better than ever. If you’ve been on the tour located in Burbank, California before, it’s a must-do all over again, especially if you consider yourself a Friends fan. In this reimagined experience, guests will get the chance to make a pitstop at Central Perk Café, which features tons of Friends Easter eggs and Insta-worthy moments.

The brand new Friends boutique includes replica sets of Central Perk, Monica and Rachel’s apartment, and Joey and Chandler’s place. While there have been Friends experiences before, this time around, you’ll truly feel like you’re in an episode of the show while enjoying a cup of delicious coffee. You could even sip on “The Chandler” caramel coconut latte while getting cozy on the iconic orange Central Perk couch. Or, order Rachel’s English trifle to eat while sitting in Monica and Rachel’s kitchen or living room.

The new Friends boutique at the Warner Bros. Studio Tour not only allows you to feel like you’re part of the show, or living out the reunion special , but it has tons of Friends Easter eggs hidden throughout for stans to find. You’ll want to spend hours just walking around the cafe looking for little nods to your favorite episodes or characters. These 11 Friends Easter eggs are just a few of the things you should look out for on your next visit.

You’ll begin your tour at the new Storytelling Showcase. It’s a brief overview of the Warner Bros. Studio’s 100-year history with nods to some of the most popular movies and TV shows filmed on the lot. Near the “Television” wall, you’ll see your first Friends Easter egg: Phoebe’s guitar from the show. This iconic prop helped bring “Smelly Cat” to the world, and you’ll definitely want to see it up close for yourself.

If you look down to the floor in the Storytelling Showcase, you’ll notice it’s actually just a giant overhead map of the Warner Bros. Studio. At the center is a small-scale version of the iconic water tower, which is a great photo op. Throughout, you’ll also notice there are 3D versions of select soundstages.

Friends was shot on Soundstage 24, and even though it isn’t one of the 3D versions in the room, you can ask your tour guide to point out where it is on the map for an overhead snap. Be sure to ask them to point it out on your tour as well, so you can get a pic of its specialty plaque.

After touring the lot, you’ll arrive at Stage 48: Script to Screen, which is where the Central Perk Café is and where the majority of your Easter egg hunt will be. When you walk through the doors, you’ll see the cafe right away, where you can purchase some Friends character-inspired drinks and one specialty menu item directly from the show: Rachel’s English trifle.

If you remember from Season 6’s “The One Where Ross Got High,” Rachel tries making an English trifle for Thanksgiving, but it goes wrong when she skips a page and adds a layer of beef. Now, you can try that trifle for yourself. Luckily, there is no meat this time, and comes in either a chocolate or vanilla version.

Once you’ve ordered your snacks from the cafe, you can enjoy them in any set from Friends you want. If you decide to relax in the Central Perk set, you may notice Joey’s headshot hung on the wall. It’s the same headshot from Season 3’s “The One with All the Jealousy” with Joey’s resume on the back that lies about his dancing abilities.

Make sure you look up to spot some of the best Easter eggs in the Friends boutique. If you do, you’ll get to see the hilarious turkey that Monica put on her head from the Season 5 Thanksgiving episode, aptly titled “The One with All the Thanksgivings.” It even has the yellow sunglasses and fez hat on top.

Next to Monica’s turkey head, you’ll see Phoebe’s bike. The pretty pink bike is from Season 7’s “The One with All the Candy,” where Ross tries to teach Phoebe how to ride a bike. It’s super cute and even has the basket at the front.

A real sight to see is Phoebe’s hilarious Glynnis portrait. The 3D painting from Season 10’s “The One with Ross's Grant” really pops in the middle of the store. It seems the Warner Bros. Studio won the fight over who gets to keep Glynnis.

Next to Glynnis, you’ll see Joey’s beloved stuffed animal, Hugsy. The penguin wearing winter attire was Joey’s “bedtime penguin pal” and could be spotted throughout the series in Joey and Chandler’s apartment. All you need to do to spot him for yourself is to look up right when you enter the Friends boutique.

Over in the Monica and Rachel’s apartment set, take a look at all the snacks and dishes on the shelves of their kitchen. At the edge of the counter, you’ll notice the vintage Cookie Time Clock cookie jar that could be seen on the show. Of course, if you watched Friends: The Reunion special on HBO Max , you’ll know it’s not the actual cookie jar prop. That one was stolen from the set by Matthew Perry and gifted to Lisa Kudrow.

In Joey and Chandler’s apartment set, you can enjoy lunch on their foosball table or while sitting in their recliners. It’s one of the coziest sections, and if you look up on one of the nearby shelves, you’ll see their blue Magna Doodle pad. For fans who have marathon-watched the show a bunch of times, you know the doodle pad is a great place to spot Easter eggs within the show. Now, it’s its own Easter egg for fans to spot IRL.

Super fans know that the exterior to the Friends apartment is located in NYC . It’s on the corner of Bedford and Grove in Greenwich Village, and there’s a nod to that in the Friends boutique. Next to Monica and Rachel’s apartment, you’ll see the NYC street sign that you can take a picture with.

The Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood reopened on June 26, and tickets are available now for future tours ($69). They even have a SoCal Resident discount for $57 you’ll want to take advantage of if you want to go on your very own Friends Easter egg hunt. The Central Perk Café and all-new Friends boutique are only available through the Studio Tour, and tours run on weekends. Starting July 15, the tour will also be available Thursday to Monday as well. WBSTH is currently following all mandated city, state, and federal guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), so make sure to have your mask with you at all times. For more information, visit WBStudioTour.com .

The CDC recommends traveling only after you’re fully vaccinated and your vaccine has become fully effective . If you’re not fully vaccinated and must travel, check the CDC guidelines before you book. Check your destination’s vaccination and testing requirements before you depart.

This article was originally published on 07.06.21

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Warner Bros. Studio Tour expands its Friends experience with new sets

See EW's exclusive photos from the updated experience, including a rebuilt set of Monica's apartment.

Samantha is a writer based in Los Angeles. Television is her one true love, and she tweets about it. A lot.

Following the Friends reunion , Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood is upgrading its fan experience.

When the tour reopens on Saturday, Friends fans will enjoy an expanded Central Perk, complete with a New York deli-inspired menu including corn beef melts, pizza wedges, fries, and more, not to mention the most important item: Central Perk coffee. Dessert offerings will include Rachel's Thanksgiving trifle — without the meat — cheesecake, and more.

Additionally, the tour has recreated sets inspired by Joey and Chandler's apartment and Monica's apartment, where you can dine at Monica's kitchen table or even on her sofa. (No crumbs allowed!)

The tour is also adding new Friends merchandise, from a collection of kitchen and dining ware to coffee mugs and other collectibles.

Get an exclusive look at the expanded experience below:

Related content:

• David Schwimmer isn't over the Friends reunion, and neither are we
• The Friends cast had a pre-reunion on Zoom, and one of them used Matt LeBlanc as their background
• Reunited Friends cast shares never-before-told memories from finale

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Revisit these iconic locations made famous by jennifer aniston and ‘friends’ on the hit show.

All the info on the fountain, the building where Chandler worked as a "transponster," the L.A. coffee shop that inspired Central Perk and more.

By Lindsay Blake, Dirt.com

Lindsay Blake, Dirt.com

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Though set in New York, Friends was lensed in Los Angeles, with many Big Apple establishing shots thrown in to help fake the East Coast backdrop. Recorded in front of a live studio audience, the vast majority of filming took place on a soundstage at Warner Bros. Studio, the lot that served as the show’s home throughout the course of its ten-year run. Several of the facility’s exterior sets and streetscapes were also utilized for outside shots.

In honor of Friends: The Reunion ’s landmark debut, Dirt has gathered together a round-up of some of the most iconic sites featured on the Must-See TV behemoth.

The quintessential New York apartment building where Rachel Green ( Jennifer Aniston ), Monica Geller (Courteney Cox), Joey Tribbiani (Matt LeBlanc) and Chandler Bing (Matthew Perry) – aka Ms. Chanandler Bong – made their home, seen in countless establishing shots throughout the show’s tenure, is an authentic NYC locale.

The locale is no stranger to the screen. The restaurant on the building’s ground floor also popped up as Kate, Nick and Zoe’s Bistro in the 2007 romantic comedy No Reservations .

The interior of Monica and Rachel’s colorful apartment, as well as that of Joey and Chandler’s (sawed-in-half door included!) were sets constructed a good 2,800 miles away at Warner Bros. Studio, located at 3400 Warner Blvd. in Burbank. The first season of the show made use of Stage 5, but by season two, after the series had become a bonafide hit, the production moved to the much larger Stage 24, which served as its home for the nine years that followed. When filming wrapped in 2004, the apartment sets were dismantled and, sadly, no longer exist (though they were re-created for Friends: The Reunion ). Stage 24, though, still stands and is now known as The Friends Stage in honor of the sitcom’s seminal success. The structure, which is also where Full House was filmed from 1993 through 1995, can be viewed in person as part of the Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood, a three-hour interactive and intimate jaunt through the lot and its facilities. (Though the production center is currently closed to the public due to the Covid-19 pandemic, tours are expected to resume this summer.)

Fans who really want to go on a Friends location deep-dive should hit up Insomnia Cafe at 7286 Beverly Blvd. in Los Angeles’ Fairfax District. To hear creator Marta Kauffman tell it (as she did in a 2010 interview with the Television Academy), “We [Kauffman and co-creator David Crane] were driving along – I think it was Beverly Boulevard – and we saw a place called the Insomnia Cafe. And I remember we were talking about how that would be a cool place to have as one of our main sets … we liked the idea of something being over-caffeinated.” So central is the eatery to Friends origin story that Kauffman and Crane even initially named the show “Insomnia Cafe!”

Amazingly, Insomnia Cafe is still in operation all these years later, serving up lattes and exhibiting the same bohemian vibe that so inspired Grande.

Meanwhile, East Coasters can hit up 51 Bank St. in the West Village, the former site of Arnold’s Turtle Vegetarian Cafe, the layout of which, with its corner door, also served as inspiration for the design of Central Perk. As art director John Shaffner told HuffPost , “The coffee house came about because there was a little restaurant that we used to all go down to on West 4th Street in Manhattan and it had a door in the corner. So we went to Kevin and Margaret [sic] and David and when we showed them the model and I said, ‘We want to do a little corner door like the restaurant that we used to go to,’ and they remembered it as well.  It was called Arnold’s Turtle.”

The eatery, named in honor of founder Arthur Fine’s first pet, moved locales in 1985 and eventually shuttered in 1990. The space that initially housed it was most recently home to a champagne bar known as Riddler, but that establishment closed down last August. Its iconic corner doorway, though, is still in place and can be viewed from the street. As HuffPost notes, it’s “not exactly Central Perk, but, for superfans, maybe worth a trip.”

Prior to being moved, the fountain, which sat in front of a picturesque row of Bostonian-style townhouses, was a big and small screen stalwart, having appeared in such productions as Dennis the Menace , Bewitched , The Monkees , The Partridge Family and Hocus Pocus .

In its current location, in the grassy area between Warner Bros.’ Embassy Court and French Street (which just so happens to be where the Friends played rugby in season four’s “The One with All the Rugby”), the fountain popped up regularly throughout the second season of All Rise .

The office where Chandler worked as a “transponster” (“That’s not even a word!”), regularly monitoring both the WENUS (Weekly Estimated Net Usage Statistics) and ANUS (Annual Net Usage Statistics), is Manhattan’s Solow Building at 9 W. 57th St. in Midtown. The sloping 50-story structure, commissioned by and named for developer Sheldon Solow, was designed by architect Gordon Bunshaft in 1974. Rising 689 feet above the ground below, the high-rise is currently “one of the most highly valued office buildings in Manhattan!”

It’s back to the West Coast for the cast’s famous season six promo shoot, in which Aniston, Cox, et al are shown walking down a supposed New York street, flanked by fire-escape-clad buildings, champagne and flowers in hand. The striking series of images was lensed on Warner Bros.’ Hennesy Street, an urban cityscape created by Academy Award-winning production designer Dale Hennesy for the 1982 musical Annie . The 13,000-square-foot “block” looks much the same today as when initially built and has been immortalized onscreen possibly more than any other section of the lot. A few of the productions to feature it include The Mask , National Lampoon’s Vacation and Two Broke Girls . Just around the corner, in a section of the set known as Tenement Alley, is where Rachel met Jean-Claude Van Damme (playing himself) in season two’s “The One After the Superbowl: Part 2.”

Another Friends locale that can be found at Warner Bros. Studio is the house belonging to Phoebe’s father. The structure appeared in several episodes, namely season two’s “The One with the Bullies,” in which Phoebe first meets her half-brother, Frank Buffay Jr. (Giovanni Ribisi). Located in the Midwest Residential Street area of the lot, the very same property was also used as the residence where Aria Montgomery (Lucy Hale) lived on the television series Pretty Little Liars and as Kate Beringer’s (Phoebe Cates) home in 1984’s Gremlins .

For those in need of an even more extensive Friends location fix, outposts of the pop-up FRIENDS Experience are currently running in New York and Chicago and one is also set to open in Atlanta this summer! Described as an “interactive celebration of the iconic TV show,” the two-story exhibits feature original prop pieces, costumes and more for fans to see up-close and personal. For those worried about attending the pop-up mid-pandemic, backers Superfly X, Warner Bros. Television Group and Warner Bros Consumer Products are assuring visitors that the venues are not just clean, but “Monica clean!”

This story first appeared on Dirt.com.

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Soundtrack Information

The Charge of the Light Brigade

Tribute Film Classics (TFC1005)

Release Date: January 20, 2009

Conducted by William T. Stromberg

Performed by The Moscow Symphony Orchestra

• The Charge Of The Light Brigade (1936)
• Max Steiner

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Track Listing

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A History of The Actors Studio

Written by Andreas Manolikakis

The Actors Studio was founded in New York by Elia Kazan, Cheryl Crawford and Robert Lewis in 1947. For seven decades it has been devoted to the service and development of theatre artists –actors, directors and playwrights. To our members, who are primarily actors, The Actors Studio offers free lifetime membership, with no fee or tuition required, which entitles them to a unique opportunity to explore and improve their craft in a safe, laboratory environment with colleagues with whom they share the same process of work.

The roots of The Actors Studio go back to the Group Theatre (1931-1941) whose work was inspired by the discoveries of the great Russian actor and director Konstantin Stanislavski and his best student Eugene Vakhtangov as revealed in the legendary productions that the Moscow Art Theatre toured in America in 1923. In fact Stanislavski’s dedication to his book, ‘My Life in Art,’ (1924) reads: “I DEDICATE THIS BOOK IN GRATITUDE TO HOSPITABLE AMERICA AS A TOKEN AND A REMEMBRANCE FROM THE MOSCOW ART THEATRE WHICH SHE TOOK SO KINDLY TO HER HEART.”

When the Moscow Art Theatre ended its American tour, several members of the theatre stayed behind and trained artists, including Lee Strasberg, Harold Clurman and Stella Adler, who would go on to form the Group Theatre along with other artists such as Elia Kazan, Sanford Meisner and Robert Lewis. These artists studied, explored, developed and improved the work of the Russian masters with extraordinary results that were unique in the history of the American theatre and a new kind of acting was born.

After the Group Theatre closed, in 1941, many of its members went their separate ways. Elia Kazan has stated that one of the principal reasons he created The Actors Studio, in 1947, was in order to preserve and develop this new American acting. He wanted to create a not-for-profit organization that would provide a laboratory, a private workshop in which the professional actor could work on his or her craft, far away from the commercial pressures of casting, rehearsal and performance. It was to be a place that would offer its member-artists an ongoing training, a continuity of work and the feeling of an artistic home like they had at the Group Theatre.

At the Studio, it was eventually decided that membership should be achieved through an audition process of preliminary and then final auditions where the only requirements are talent and the possibility of improvement.

In 1948, Lee Strasberg was asked by Elia Kazan to join the Studio as one of its teachers and in 1951 he became its Artistic Director, a position he maintained until his death in 1982. Strasberg’s deep understanding of the Stanislavski System and the reformulations of Vakhtangov, together with his own personal discoveries and improvements on the acting process, provided the foundation on which The Actors Studio based its work.

At the same time, the work of Elia Kazan as a theatre and film director demonstrated in the most powerful way the extraordinary results of the deep and personal process of acting espoused by The Actors Studio.

For seven decades, the very existence of The Actors Studio, the principles and values that it represents, the methodology of its work process, its consistency and long life have established the Studio as a unique theatre organization and a guiding light for actors, directors and playwrights around the world. For many it is considered the temple of the acting process.

Today the work that is done at The Actors Studio continues the Stanislavski-Vakhtangov-American approach, and most of the leading members of the Studio today have studied with more than one of these great American teachers: Lee Strasberg, Harold Clurman, Elia Kazan, Stella Adler, Sanford Meisner and Robert Lewis.

Currently, Ellen Burstyn, Alec Baldwin and Al Pacino serve as co-Presidents of the Studio. Beau Gravitte serves as Artistic Director in New York and Salome Jens and Lou Antonio serve as interim co-Associate Artistic Directors in West Hollywood at our Actors Studio West branch, which opened in 1966. The Actors Studio is governed by a Board of Directors comprised of members from both coasts.

After 70 years, The Actors Studio continues to thrive because it is needed. Goethe has said that, “The actor’s career develops in public, but his art develops in private.” The Studio provides its members with this special kind of privacy, along with a group of colleagues who share the same passion for what Studio members refer to as “The Work.”

In spite of the presence of The Actors Studio over many years and its extensive influence in America and worldwide, there still persist many misunderstandings of the Studio, its mentors, its philosophy and its process. These errors most often arise from discussions by some academics, theoreticians, historians and even by some theatre professionals who attempt to analyze and interpret a process of work that they have never learned through serious practice. The work of Stanislavski, Vakhtangov and The Actors Studio was arrived at through deep and lengthy practical experiments that elude rational analysis by non-practitioners.

In 1994 The Actors Studio entered a major new phase with the creation of The Actors Studio Drama School MFA (Master of Fine Arts) Program in acting, directing and playwriting, in order to bring the Studio’s method into a university setting. In September 2006, the Actors Studio Drama School moved to Pace University in downtown New York City, which also is the home of one of the program’s most visible teaching platforms, INSIDE THE ACTORS STUDIO, hosted by James Lipton.

Andreas Manolikakis is a Board Member of The Actors Studio and Chair of The Actors Studio Drama School at Pace University in New York City.

Bill Downs, War Correspondent

October 17, 2016, 1943. stalin previews the hollywood film "mission to moscow".

Since its release early last month, Warner Brothers and Joseph E. Davies's "Mission to Moscow" has thrived on controversy ( Newsweek, May 10). Vociferously attacked on the one side as a whitewash of the Soviet regime, and just as staunchly defended on the other as a worthy tribute to a gallant ally, the film has currently split Hollywood leaders into two sharply divided camps on the advisability of making films with political implications. The following dispatch from Bill Downs, Newsweek correspondent in Moscow, survived a three-day delay at the censor's desk to add an international huff and a puff to the storm in a samovar. The Russian premier of "Mission" was staged at the Kremlin, following a banquet for an international audience of diplomatic elect. Flanked on one side by a translator, and on the other by a beaming Joe Davies (then on his return engagement as missionary to Moscow), Stalin sat poker-faced throughout the two-hour tribute to his people and regime. The next night the print was loaned to the United States Embassy and run off for the staff and a group of newspaper correspondents. In each case the audience reaction is best summed up in one word—squirm. And alternating with the squirming was the self-conscious tittering of those who had to sit in the Presence while an onscreen Joe Davies held forth on the subject of Joe Davies. On occasion there were cinematic touches that provoked outright laughter. A bevy of Russian girls tricked out in ski-and-skating costumes looked just like what they were—Hollywood extras. Frieda Inescort , playing Madame Molotoff , attempted a spot of Russian dialogue that gave the Moscow natives a bad moment. And when the camera faded in on a Muscovite restaurant featuring the soulful strumming of a gypsy orchestra, several young army officers at the preview enthusiastically volunteered to withdraw on the off-chance of finding the place. Stalin's poker face may have derived from the fact that the film's portrayal of the Soviet Premier was judged the least adequate in a roster of generally excellent characterizations. Playing Stalin for sweetness and light, Manart Kippen missed the strength and power and twinkling humor with which Stalin invariably impresses foreign visitors. There was less of the dead-pan among members of the British diplomatic legation, with some officials pointedly hinting that the film's unfriendly, inept, and undiplomatic conception of His Majesty's representatives to Russia was ill-advised. No one doubts that "Mission to Moscow" will be a sensational success in Russia, if only because the Soviets are anxious to see how they look to a foreign, though friendly, observer. At the same time, it was unanimously agreed that the Warner film was excellent propaganda for fostering better relations between the United States and the Soviet Union, although a number of changes are indicated if the film is to obviate a tendency of the realistic Russians to laugh out loud at the wrong places.