Dia Dipasupil/Getty '90s nostalgia?Zoë Kravitzsays bring it on. But the casual homophobia laced throughout so much media from the decade? Keep it. The star ofBig Little Liesconfessed her new film,Caught Stealing, kindles a powerful yearning for some aspects of the era. "[I'm] really nostalgic for that time," Kravitz recentlytold PEOPLE. "Then also the fashion, all that stuff's so cool. New York City and the grunge." But there's one thing she'd never ditch the 2020s for: "Super homophobic jokes on mainstream television. If you watchFriendsnow you're like, 'Whoa.'" Kravitz's costar in Darren Aronofsky's comic crime caper,Austin Butler, responded to Kravitz's reservation with shock, asking, "Wow, even inFriends?" Kravitz replied, "Oh, so much inFriends. Like, things that aren't punchlines are punchlines. It's wild. So maybe that? We can keep that there." Sign up forEntertainment Weekly's free daily newsletterto get breaking news, exclusive first looks, recaps, reviews, interviews with your favorite stars, and more. The placid sitcom centered on the lives of six young adults living in New York City seems the platonic ideal of an unproblematic fave, having been syndicated and streamed continually by millions since it left the air over 20 years ago. ButFriends' queer fan base would have no trouble telling you exactly how regressive the series could be. Two of the main storylines that makeFriendsa particularly hard rewatch, where LGBTQ rights are concerned, are the relationship between Carol (Jane Sibbett), Ross' (David Schwimmer) ex-wife and her longtime girlfriend Susan (Jessica Hecht), and Chandler's (Matthew Perry) trans parent. The episodes featuring Carol and Susan, particularly the season 2 episode "The One With the Lesbian Wedding," are rife with jokes at the queer couple's expense, and many in the cast and crew have expressed retroactive regret for how derisively Chandler's parent was written and treated. "We kept referring to her as Chandler's father, even though Chandler's father was trans,"Friendscreator Marta Kauffmannoted in 2022. "Pronouns were not yet something that I understood... So we didn't refer to that character as she. That was a mistake." In 2018, the actress who played the character, Kathleen Turner,declared, "The show hasn't aged well." Read the original article onEntertainment Weekly
