Why Friends Recast Ross' Ex-Wife Carol After Just One Episode
"Friends" viewers will of course remember Ross' ex-wife Carol... but they might not remember she looked a little different at first.
When the mega-hit sitcom debuted on NBC in 1994, Ross was freshly lamenting the end of his marriage, with his wife Carol leaving him after she came out as gay and fell in love with a woman named Susan. In the second episode of Season 1, we meet Carol, played by Anita Barone, as she tells Ross she's pregnant with his baby, leading to an awkward sonogram appointment with the two of them and Susan. But in subsequent episodes, the role of Carol is played by Jane Sibbett. So what happened?
It seems that Barone — who previously played chef Gail Cunningham in a Season 4 episode of "Seinfeld" — wanted a more long-term TV role, according to UK newspaper the Daily Express, which reports that Barone "was looking to be a more permanent fixture on another project and so decided to leave 'Friends' behind her and audition for other shows."
It's more understandable when you learn that "Friends" producers originally saw Carol as a three-episode role. Sibbett recently recalled that she was only hired to play Carol in two Season 1 episodes after Barone left, but then "Friends" co-creator Marta Kauffman "said she saw something in the way I was playing [Carol], that I was playing it for real. I wasn't playing it for laughs... She loved it so much, she wanted to have it in the show, and so then I was asked if I would just be a recurring character."
Carol became a key supporting character on Friends
Jane Sibbett went on to play Carol in more than a dozen episodes of "Friends," with Carol giving birth to Ross' son Ben in Season 1 and marrying her girlfriend Susan (played by Jessica Hecht) in Season 2. Sibbett popped up periodically as Carol in the first seven seasons of "Friends," making her final appearance in Season 7's "The One With the Truth About London."
Anita Barone, meanwhile, did find what she was looking for, booking a series-regular role on ABC's "The Jeff Foxworthy Show" in 1995, playing Jeff's wife Karen. The role was short-lived, though: The show moved from ABC to NBC after one season, but Barone was recast (again!), with Ann Cusack playing Karen in the second — and final — season.
Barone went on to appear on "Party of Five" and "Chicago Hope" before landing another series-regular role in 2000 on the NBC sitcom "Daddio," playing the TV wife of star Michael Chiklis. That show, too, was short-lived, airing for two truncated seasons before getting canceled.
Disney Channel fans may also remember Barone as Georgia, the mom of Bella Thorne's CeCe, on "Shake It Up." She's still working, too, guest-starring in an episode of ABC's "A Million Little Things" in 2023. Sibbett, meanwhile, went on to book guest roles on "Sabrina the Teenage Witch," "Ally McBeal," and "Once and Again" after her "Friends" stint ended. But she'll always be remembered by "Friends" fans as Carol... even if they don't remember she wasn't the first to play Carol.