Lisa Kudrow Was a Published Scientist When Friends Debuted

Phoebe Buffay believed in psychics, crystals, and just about everything science struggled to verify. The real Lisa Kudrow has a peer-reviewed medical paper to her name.

The Biology Student at Vassar

Kudrow earned a biology degree from Vassar College, a liberal arts college in Poughkeepsie, New York. She went there intending to become an expert on headaches, like her father.

Her Father's Headache Practice

Her father, Dr. Lee Kudrow, was a doctor who specialized in treating headaches, and he published research on cluster headaches.

After college Lisa worked for him as a medical researcher while she tried to break into acting. Wikipedia puts it at eight years, and says she earned a research credit on his study of whether left-handed people are more likely to develop cluster headaches.

The Published Paper

In February 1994, a study titled "Handedness and Headache" appeared in Cephalalgia, the international journal of headache. Its four listed authors were H.B. Messinger, M.I. Messinger, L. Kudrow (her father) and L.V. Kudrow (Lisa).

The California study counted left-handers among 199 men and 74 women with cluster headache and 477 migraine patients. Earlier reported data had suggested left-handedness in over 15% of cluster headache patients. In this larger set the figure was 11.0% for men and 8.2% for women, and migraine patients were close behind at 11.8% and 8.1%. Neither group differed significantly from the expected 10%.

A Career Pivot

While working for her father, Kudrow had been building a second life as a comedian and actor, and by 1994 she was landing television roles.

That September, Friends debuted on NBC and Phoebe Buffay arrived, a character who believed in far more than any lab could confirm.

Friends ran for ten seasons and made Kudrow one of the most recognizable faces in television. In the journal's record, L.V. Kudrow is still a credited co-author on a study about headaches and handedness.