Courtesy of Frank Micelotta/Invision for Academy of Television Arts & Sciences/AP ImagesJennifer Aniston certainly let the cat out of the bag during the Television Academy's An Evening Honoring James Burrows in Los Angeles earlier this week.
She revealed that she was asked to sit out of cast photos for Friends in case she didn't end up playing the character Rachel Green, Us Weekly reports.
According to Burrows, the hit series' director, Aniston had shot five other pilots before landing her big breakout role.
Aniston was originally signed on to star in the CBS sitcom Muddling Through when she met with Burrows for an audition.
"We took her in second position," he explained about hiring the 44-year-old actress. "So [when] that show was cancelled, we were able to use her."
But Aniston's prior engagements seemed to get a little in the way of her Friends commitments.
"Not knowing that though, I had to sit out when we were doing out cast photos," the stunning star shared.
"When we were shooting the first grouping of cast photos [for Friends] in front of that fountain, I was asked to step out of a bunch because they didn't know if I was going to be still playing Rachel."
She also recalled a moment when a man recognized her on set from another pilot.
The man asked at the time, "Who are you? What's your story? And I said, ‘Well, I'm doing a bunch of pilots and this is just my sixth pilot and I'm just hoping that it goes.' And he said, ‘But you're on another show' and I said, ‘Yeah.' And he said, ‘You know they're going to pick that show up just to try to mess with Friends because this is going to be a great show.' And I was like, ‘No. They would never do that.' And sure enough I remember we were at the upfronts and they literally came out with the announcement that they picked us up for three episodes."
But clearly everything worked out better than she had ever imagined.
The show went on to win countless awards and catapulted Aniston into A-list status almost instantly.