Friends fans have hailed a casting decision made almost 30 years ago, calling it ‘the best ever’ after coming across the same actor in 2024.
Joshua Duvall Preston, now 35, starred in a solitary episode of the legendary 1990s sitcom, playing a very young Chandler Bing.
The world was shocked and heartbroken in October 2023 when Chandler’s main actor, Matthew Perry, died suddenly at the age of just 54.
But Perry’s memory lives on in his performance as Chandler, with Friends remaining hugely popular to this day on streaming platforms like Netflix.
And a curious person, who was re-watching Friends for the 100th time, had a pleasant surprise when they went looking for the only other actor to play Chandler on the show.
By 1998, the hit sitcom was one of the biggest shows in the world, with its special Thanksgiving episodes a November staple in many American households.
In the fifth season episode The One With All the Thanksgivings, Joshua, nine years old at the time, played a young Chandler in a flashback.
During the Thanksgiving flashback, nine-year-old Chandler is told by his mother Nora (Morgan Fairchild) that she is planning to divorce Chandler’s dad.
The reason for the divorce is an affair that the unnamed Mr. Bing has been having with ‘the house boy’, who then serves turkey to a traumatised Chandler.
At that point in the series, the full identity of Chandler’s dad is not known, and his face is never seen in the scene starring the young Chandler.
Joshua then gives his best impression of Chandler’s outraged face – despite not having any lines, he left a huge mark on the series.
And fans on Reddit celebrated him on Thursday, with fans unable to contain their excitement that Joshua now resembled Perry so much.
‘Never looked him up until today. They have the same smile!’ said Bidb90, while Canentia spotted the same thing: ‘They even smile the same, that’s crazy.’
Some people even thought that the young Chandler had been played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who was also a sitcom child star in the 1990s.
The user who brought it up, who has since deleted their Reddit account, called the decision to cast Joshua, ‘Honest to god, the best casting [choice].’
Before his brief work on Friends, Joshua he also starred in the 1995 films Nixon and Father of the Bride 2, which starred Steve Martin.
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However, after Friends, Joshua took a long break from acting, only returning to the industry in 2016 in the short film The Belsen Baby.
He made a return to TV in the 2017 series Alternative Lifestyle, also known as Sugar Pine 7, and then the short horror film The Woods.
Since leaving TV and film behind, Joshua has been working in the voiceover industry, providing words for commercials in America.
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Friends is available to stream on Netflix in the UK.
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