After years of shying away from social media, Friends actress Jennifer Aniston has joined Instagram – and her first photo was certainly a crowd pleaser.
The 50-year-old uploaded a photo of her and her fellow Friends cast mates including Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Matthew Perry and David Schwimmer.
The photo was taken during a recent reunion to celebrate 25 years since the sitcom aired. She captioned the post “And now we’re Instagram FRIENDS too. HI INSTAGRAM.”
Speaking about the cast reunion during a recent interview, Jennifer said they laughed “a lot” during the “civilised” dinner at Courteney Cox’s house.
She said: “Schwimmer was in town and we all happened to have a window of time so we all got together. We laughed so hard.”
Within an hour her account had gained 116,000 followers and the post had generated hundreds of thousands of likes before the platform crashed due to the high demand. A day later she has 2.8 million followers and counting.
Jennifer’s ex-husband Justin Theroux, who she split from in 2017, was one of the first people to comment on the photograph as he wrote: “Woot-Woot.”
Her close friend, fellow actress Reese Witherspoon commented “YASSSS!!! Welcome to Insta Jen!!!”
Jennifer hinted earlier this week that she was thinking about joining Instagram. Speaking about social media, she said “you can actually have a little bit more control over the narrative that’s out there.
“[You can] right some wrongs and some silly things that, God knows, are said often. Maybe [I’ll join]. You never know.”
Watch: 3 times Jennifer Aniston handled vicious rumours like a boss. Article continues below.
Jennifer has recently spoken out about the public obsession with her personal life, saying it “diminishes everything I’ve succeeded at, and that I’ve built and created.”
Rather than distracting her from her goals, however, she says it drives her to stay productive. “I focus even harder to tune out the noise,” she says. “I work hard and challenge myself so I can rise above the toxicity that’s out there.”
While Jen has only just joined social media, she admitted in an interview with In Style magazine last year that she has long been an Instagram “voyeur.”
“I will totally admit that I can dip into Instagram and sort of be a secret voyeur,” she revealed.
“I’m a creeper. There are times when I’ll look through and think, ‘Oh my god, what a time suck!’ I’ve been with people who spend maybe an hour figuring out this one post, and you’re like, ‘That just took up an hour of your life, and it’s gone in 60 seconds,'” she said.
Now, however, Jen has given her fans ample opportunity to pore over her own posts. Knowing how straightforward and honest she tends to be though, she’s not likely to leave anything open to interpretation.
