Friends Director on the Time He Loaned the Stars $200 — and Eventually Helped Them Make Millions

For the cast of Friends, what happened in Vegas didn't stay in Vegas — and that ultimately sparked the tight-knit bond that would reshape TV history.

In an excerpt from series director James Burrows' memoir, Directed by James Burrows, the 81-year-old recalls a Las Vegas trip he took with the cast that helped build their chemistry prior to the series premiere.

"As director, I am there to help create the ensemble, to do everything I can to foster a community among the company, and to train a new set of actors to behave as a group and respect one another," Burrows says in an excerpt obtained by WSJ. Magazine. "The first thing I did to facilitate this was to make sure the cast had every opportunity to become friends in real life."

Burrows had asked then-president/CEO of Warner Bros. Television, Les Moonves, if he could "borrow the corporate jet to take the young cast to Las Vegas." The trip probably proved to be one of the best decision Burrows and the network ever made.

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"I made a reservation for just the seven of us at Spago. I asked for the center table in the restaurant, where everyone could see us," Burrows recalls. "I knew the show had a chance to really take off and told the kids, 'This is your last shot at anonymity. Once the show airs, you guys will never be able to go anywhere without being hounded.' None of them believed me. None of them had any money at that point either, so I gave each of them a couple of hundred bucks to go gamble."

He continues, "I laid out $1,400. If the math doesn't seem right, it's because [Matt] LeBlanc had no idea how to play craps and he lost his $200 in seconds, so I gave him another $200," he continues. "They went back to Los Angeles, the show premiered, they've never had a shot at anonymity since, and they each wrote me reimbursement checks for the money I gave them."

Reisig & Taylor/NBCU Photo Bank/Getty Friends cast

RELATED: How the Friends Cast Has Stayed Close for 25 Years: 'They Have Really Leaned on Each Other'

Friends ran on NBC for 10 seasons airing between 1994 and 2004, starring LeBlanc (Joey Tribbiani), Jennifer Aniston (Rachel Green), Courteney Cox (Monica Geller), Lisa Kudrow (Phoebe Buffay), Matthew Perry (Chandler Bing) and David Schwimmer (Ross Geller).

Burrows shares in his memoir that it took two episodes for him "to get a shorthand with the cast," and the group was able to become "real friends" thereafter.

"It was about bonding," he adds. "They genuinely adored one another. A director and cast live for that kind of connection."

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Chris Haston/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images via Getty (L-R) David Schwimmer, Matt LeBlanc, James Burrows, Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox and Lisa Kudrow

As Burrows tells it, he was instrumental in the cast banding together to negotiate their famous raise to each get $1 million per episode.

"After the first season, the group sought my advice about how to renegotiate their contracts," he writes. "I advised them to negotiate as a group and stay in lockstep financially. Negotiating with the six individually would have given the network leverage against each of them. Since it was clear that there were no subsidiary characters in the series, it made sense to me for them to stick together."

He explains, "The show was a home run. If the network could pay six million dollars an episode to the group, you could only imagine how much money they were making. By negotiating separately and pitting them against one another, the network could have easily destroyed all the chemistry they'd developed. If you have equally talented people who become a family, you need to treat them that way. It's the right thing to do and it's also good business."

Of course, the move became a game-changer for the industry: "In what made international news at the time, it became precedent for sitcom stars to be paid the same amount. After the second season, each of the Will & Grace stars also got paid the same amount for the duration of the show, for the same reason that the Friends stars did — they had all become equals."

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In the years since its departure from air, Friends' popularity has only grown amid the streaming age. Last year, the continued love for the series remained evident when the entire cast came together for an HBO Max reunion special.

"It was an incredible time," Cox, 57, told her costars during the reunion. "Everything came together. We became best friends through just the chemistry, the whole thing. It was life-changing and it forever will be — not just for us, but for people who watch it, and that's such a great feeling to carry forever. I'm really thankful, and I love you guys so much."

Directed by James Burrows hits shelves on June 7.