Lady Gaga, K-pop stars BTS join 'Friends' reunion special

The much-awaited "Friends" reunion will be broadcast on May 27 and will feature a slew of celebrity guests including Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga, and K-Pop stars BTS, HB0 Max has announced.

Friends: The Reunion, featuring Jennifer Aniston, Lisa Kudrow, Courteney Cox, David Schwimmer, Matt LeBlanc and Matthew Perry, was originally set to have been filmed more than a year ago but was repeatedly delayed by the pandemic.

The unscripted, one-off special was filmed earlier this year on the same sound stage in Los Angeles as the original comedy about six young 20-somethings living in New York.

News of the broadcast date for the reunion quickly became the top trending item worldwide on Twitter.

"The one with us finally getting together," quipped Kudrow on Instagram, with Cox adding she felt "blessed to have reunited with my Friends... and it was better than ever".

"Could we be any more excited?" wrote Aniston on her official Instagram handle.

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HBO Max said more than 15 celebrity guests would also take part, including former Friends cast members Tom Selleck (Richard), and Maggie Wheeler (Janice) and others such as British football star David Beckham, Game of Thrones star Kit Harington and Pakistan's Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai.

Friends, which ended its 10 year-run on NBC television in 2004, was one of the most popular TV shows of the 1990s and found a new life on streaming platforms where it is one of the most watched shows worldwide.