Melora Hardin Says She was "Freaked Out" Working w/ Marcel the Monkey - Sitcoms Online Message Boards

JamesG · 12-24-2025, 08:25 PM

Melora Hardin Explains Why she was "Totally Freaked Out" to Work with Marcel the Monkey on "Friends"
by Ryan Coleman
December 24, 2025

Melora Hardin loves working with animals, but knows that sometimes it can be a nightmare.

"I've worked with so many animals in my career," the actress tells Entertainment Weekly. "It's crazy. I mean, when I was younger, the whole animal thing was not like it is now. Really. I was probably eight feet from a mountain lion, a bear, a tiger. No, not a tiger," she laughs.

"Everybody hated the monkey on Friends," Hardin says. "They all hated working with the monkey."

She explains: "Again, I'm very comfortable with animals, so I was like, 'Okay, from the trainer, you could tell it was a very high-strung monkey... It was the same kind of monkey [as on Equal Justice]. Those monkeys are just so high strung. They're really hyper kind of animals. They're really highly anxious."

Despite the cast's aversion to Marcel, Hardin recalls, "I felt safe because I just love animals. The trainers were great, and they were always really nice to me. Looking back on it, I don't know, I suppose something bad could have happened. Totally. But it never did."

"When I came on to Friends and was dealing with the monkey, and he had to be hanging off my hair, I was just kind of like, 'Tell me what to do.' I could see the monkey was in the trainer's sight line. When we rehearsed it, I understood you can't get big, because the monkey will respond to it."

Hardin had to engineer a kind of double performance, in which she reacted with enough panic to appear believable, but not so much that she genuinely spooked the simian star.

"It is an interesting challenge as an actor, because in that particular scene, I had to make sure I was doing it in a way that the monkey didn't think I was really doing that, I wasn't really freaking out. But the audience had to feel I was freaking out. So I had to pick movements that were not going to freak the monkey out, but would look real to the audience."

How did she actually feel performing the scene as scripted? "I was totally freaked out."

https://ew.com/why-melora-hardin-was...iends-11870850

12-24-2025, 08:25 PM	#1
JamesG Freakshow Moderator Forum Icon Join Date: Feb 01, 2008 Location: Brooklyn, NY Posts: 57,032	Melora Hardin Says She was "Freaked Out" Working w/ Marcel the Monkey *Melora Hardin Explains Why she was "Totally Freaked Out" to Work with Marcel the Monkey on "Friends"* by Ryan Coleman December 24, 2025 Melora Hardin loves working with animals, but knows that sometimes it can be a nightmare. "I've worked with so many animals in my career," the actress tells Entertainment Weekly. "It's crazy. I mean, when I was younger, the whole animal thing was not like it is now. Really. I was probably eight feet from a mountain lion, a bear, a tiger. No, not a tiger," she laughs. "Everybody hated the monkey on Friends," Hardin says. "They all hated working with the monkey." She explains: "Again, I'm very comfortable with animals, so I was like, 'Okay, from the trainer, you could tell it was a very high-strung monkey... It was the same kind of monkey [as on Equal Justice]. Those monkeys are just so high strung. They're really hyper kind of animals. They're really highly anxious." Despite the cast's aversion to Marcel, Hardin recalls, "I felt safe because I just love animals. The trainers were great, and they were always really nice to me. Looking back on it, I don't know, I suppose something bad could have happened. Totally. But it never did." "When I came on to Friends and was dealing with the monkey, and he had to be hanging off my hair, I was just kind of like, 'Tell me what to do.' I could see the monkey was in the trainer's sight line. When we rehearsed it, I understood you can't get big, because the monkey will respond to it." Hardin had to engineer a kind of double performance, in which she reacted with enough panic to appear believable, but not so much that she genuinely spooked the simian star. "It is an interesting challenge as an actor, because in that particular scene, I had to make sure I was doing it in a way that the monkey didn't think I was really doing that, I wasn't really freaking out. But the audience had to feel I was freaking out. So I had to pick movements that were not going to freak the monkey out, but would look real to the audience." How did she actually feel performing the scene as scripted? "I was totally freaked out." https://ew.com/why-melora-hardin-was...iends-11870850 Attached Images