A kiss is not just a kiss.
Former “Boy Meets World” star Will Friedle is opening up about his first on-screen kiss, which took place with Keri Russell when she was a guest star on the beloved ABC comedy.
Friedle and former co-stars Danielle Fishel and Rider Strong spoke to People about their new podcast, “Pod Meets World,” when they began looking back at some of the series’ guest stars.
“Keri Russell as your girlfriend,” Fishel said to Friedle. “That was your first onscreen kiss.”
Friedle said it was memorable, but not necessarily for the right reasons.
“My first on-camera kiss, yes. It was crazy,” he said. “Our teeth bumped. I was mortified.”
Long before she earned any of her three Emmy nominations, Russell appeared in a 1993 episode of “Boy Meets World” during the show’s first season, portraying Mr. Feeny’s niece. While she visits him, Eric, played by Friedle, takes a liking to her, leading to an eventual locking of the lips.
The episode marked Russell’s first TV appearance, according to IMDb, and only her second on-screen role, after the movie “Honey, I Blew Up the Kid.”
Russell is among a laundry list of notable names who appeared on “Boy Meets World,” which signed off in 2000.
“It’s funny, because people will then do the deep dive going into ‘Boy Meets World,’ and they’ll put together lists of, ‘You forgot they were on ‘Boy Meets World.’ Some of them will pop up and it’s like, ‘Oh, that’s right. I can’t believe they were on the show,’” Friedle said. “Yasmine Bleeth. Nick Foley. Vader. We had some of the greatest guest stars ever.”
Friedle said there were also “some guest stars that really became part of the family.”
“We had several tiers of guest stars, some that just kept coming back,” Friedle said. “Willie Garson came back three or four times as different people. It was really cool. It was a ton of fun.”
Adam Scott, Linda Cardellini, Marcia Cross, the Monkees, Mena Suvari, Brittany Murphy, Robert Goulet, Rue McClanahan, Melissa Joan Hart and Jennifer Love Hewitt are just some of the other notable names who made guest appearances on the show.
On “Pod Meets World,” Friedle, Fishel and Strong will rewatch all the episodes of “Boy Meets World.”
“Hopefully, we have some good behind-the-scenes stories to pepper in,” he continued. “Then, I think there’s another level, which is kind of like this memoir project where we are going to be constantly reflecting on our own lives and how the things we don’t remember or do remember are now being sort of reevaluated.”