Fans of Friends were buzzing after a recent photo of one of the show’s former stars surfaced online, nearly 30 years after his debut as Rachel’s charming yet troublesome boyfriend.
On Monday, a Reddit user posted a recent snapshot of the actor who portrayed Paolo, Rachel’s flirtatious Italian neighbor from the sitcom’s first season in 1994.
Paolo made his memorable entrance in the seventh episode, sweeping Rachel off her feet—only to reveal his less-than-princely side by hitting on Phoebe five episodes later.
Despite his character’s brief and controversial stint, fans couldn’t help but admire how well the actor has aged, with one Reddit commenter noting, ‘Aged like a fine wine (way better now than in ’94).’
Can you guess who this handsome actor is?
It’s 62-year-old Matera, Italy native Cosimo Fusco.
Though Paolo remains his most iconic role, the actor has since appeared in films like Gone in Sixty Seconds and Angels & Demons, and made guest appearances on TV shows such as Alias and The Mentalist.
Another fan on reddit shared, ‘He looks way better now!’ as yet another chimed in, ‘Man he’s good looking. But then again he always was.’
One simply summarized it by writing, ‘He was always a good looking guy, they just deliberately used hair and costume to make him look like someone from the cover of an erotic novel, as slimy as possible.’
The Reddit post follows Fusco’s revelation that he ad-libbed many of his lines while portraying the charming lover boy on Friends.
‘I was asked to improvise,’ Fusco told the Today show in 2019 in honor of the beloved sitcom’s 25th anniversary.
‘I was a little bit skeptical, because my English then wasn’t as good as it is now, let’s face it. But I was told not to speak any English. “Just say whatever you want in Italian.”‘
‘I made up most of the Italian spoken by Paolo,’ he admitted at the time.
‘When I’m standing by the window with Jennifer, and I say, “Look at the moon, look at the stars.” … I just made up those lines.’
At the time, Fusco shared that he frequently gets asked about his experience kissing Jennifer Aniston during his time on Friends.
‘She was a lovely, adorable young woman — a very talented actress,’ he said.
‘The combination of the six [actors] was amazing, the chemistry was amazing,’ he recalled. ‘And they were so generous with me, because they understood that I was a young guy from Italy thrown into a sitcom.’
