Image from: Missed (2013)
Maya dove into the archives. Friends wasn't filmed in 1994. The first episode's date code was 1991. A full three years before NBC announced the show. She found a production memo buried in the studio's digital dump: "Project Central Perk – Pilot Shot, 1991. Six actors + one unknown."
The first few pages were fine. There's nothing to tell! It's just a guy I work with. [Laugh track] CHANDLER: Ooh, is it with the "O" face? O... O... [Loud, raucous laugh track] But as Maya typed, something odd happened. Between the scripted lines and the canned laughter, she began to notice gaps . On screen, after a joke, the camera would hold on a space between Rachel and Monica. A space that seemed… occupied.
During a wide shot of all six friends laughing at a joke Jon Lovitz's character told, there was a seventh person. A young woman, maybe nineteen, wearing a faded yellow sundress. She sat on the arm of Chandler's recliner, invisible to the cast, but not to the camera. And she was crying.