Did You Know Matt Leblanc’s Spinoff Joey Was Canceled After Two Seasons? Here’s The Behind-The-Scenes Drama That Led To Its Demise

NBC announced Joey before Friends even ended. The network’s president, Jeff Zucker, claimed Joey had become “the character America roots for.”

Expectations were big-time, but the show never captured the Friends’ magic. It followed Joey as he left NYC for LA for acting, moving in with his nerdy nephew Michael (Paulo Costanzo) and reuniting with his sister Gina (Drea de Matteo). New city, new cast, but same ol’ Joey. On paper, it sounded like a hit.

But things started going south fast. The first hiccup? Joey wasn’t the original plan. While Zucker claimed LeBlanc was the only Friends star approached for a spin-off, executive producer Kevin Bright later revealed that wasn’t true. NBC initially pitched the idea of a Monica and Chandler spin-off (Courteney Cox and Matthew Perry declined), and even Jennifer Aniston was approached but chose movies over TV. By the time they circled back to Joey, he became the last man standing.

Then there was the issue of Joey himself. In Friends, Joey’s lovable, goofy charm worked because it was balanced by the rest of the cast. His dumb-but-sweet personality fit into the ensemble perfectly. But in Joey, the character didn’t evolve. In fact, Bright admitted, “We tried to present a Joey they didn’t know… even I don’t know what Joey was doing in that show.” Without his Friends squad to ground him, Joey’s antics started to feel stale and exaggerated.