United Kingdom, April 25 -- Lisa Kudrow has hit out at the "mean" behaviour of the largely-male writers on Friends.

The 62-year-old actress - who became a household name playing Phoebe Buffay on the beloved sitcom - was close to the rest of the cast of the show but behind the scenes, things could be "intense", with insults hurled if an actor messed up their line and a culture of lewd discussions.

Lisa told The Times magazine: "There was definitely mean stuff going on behind the scenes."

Of the 12-15 people in the largely-male writers' room, she added: "Don't forget we were recording in front of a live audience of 400, and if you messed up one of these writers' lines or it didn't get the perfect response they could be like, 'Can't the b...