Noah Wyle Never Realized That ER and Friends Have a ‘Crazy’ Rachel Green Connection (Exclusive)

During the early days of Noah Wyle's time on ER, he and costar George Clooney also guest-starred in an episode of Friends, making for a very cheeky crossover for the two popular NBC shows.

In 1995, during season 1 of Friends, both Wyle and Clooney, who were also in their first season of playing doctors John Carter and Doug Ross, respectively, appeared on the episode, "The One with Two Parts." The two portrayed attractive doctors who come across Rachel (Jennifer Aniston) and Monica (Courteney Cox), when the women switch identities so they can share insurance coverage.  

While the two shows don't exist in the same TV universe, they do have an unexpected connection that Wyle only realized recently while reflecting on his time on ER with PEOPLE. It turns out that both shows have characters named Rachel Green(e), with the one on ER being Mark Greene's daughter, Rachel, who was played by Yvonne Zima and Hallee Hirsh during the first 10 seasons of the show. 

"I have to say that until you just said that, I have never made that connection in my life," Wyle says when asked if he was aware of that overlap. "I'm not kidding. Like, until you just said Rachel Green, I realized that that, of course, was Dr. Greene's daughter as well."

He adds, "I never made that connection. That's crazy. I don't know that anybody ever did." 

George Clooney Says He's 'Still Close' with His 'ER' Costars: 'That Was a Job of a Lifetime'

Surprisingly, it's not the only connection the two shows have, with Wyle revealing in a 2024 interview with the Television Academy that he knew both Aniston, 56, and Matthew Perry "socially" off-set. "Jennifer was roommates with my ex-girlfriend, and their other best friend was Matt's girlfriend. So we all used to pal around," he said, adding that he and Perry, who died in 2023 at 54 years old, both did screen tests together.  

"So it felt quite natural and quite organic to have all these people that I knew and liked, to see them be on these shows that were very popular. We were all working hard and selling them hard, and it was a great time," he continued. 

Wyle also said that the idea for the crossover not only came from NBC, but from the fact that they were already spending so much time on the Friends set. "[George and I] would go over there and watch them tape. We would wrap, and then we'd go over there and watch them tape their show just because we were all buddies," he said. "And I think the fact that we were there hanging out put a bug in — put the idea in somebody's mind."

Why Noah Wyle Returned to the ER in The Pitt After Avoiding Medical Dramas 'for the Longest Time' (Exclusive)

While talking to PEOPLE, Wyle also dished on working with Clooney, revealing that the notorious prankster sometimes had difficulties with his lines.

"I'm certainly not the first to report that to avoid screwing up, George would write his lines on the pillowcase of the patients so he could just look at them with those beautiful brown eyes and read them right off," he says. 

The actor adds, "We were a pretty dedicated bunch. We used to have betting pools on how few takes it would take to get a big complicated scene, and we would really pride ourselves on never being the one to make a mistake. It was very competitive that way. Very healthy though."

When it comes to returning to that genre on TV with The Pitt, he says having to spout all those lines full of medical jargon on the Max original series was "like getting to go back to high school." Wyle explains, "Knowing what I know now, it was like picking up an instrument that I haven't played in 15 years and finding that my fingers still knew where the notes were. It was like remembering your high school French."

New episodes of The Pitt debut Thursdays on Max.