TV

A US Writer Has Found “Ugly Naked Guy” From ‘Friends’ After A Valiant Year-Long Quest

This is either the most incredible or upsetting thing on the internet today.

by Meg Watson  1 June 2016

Want more Junkee in your life? Sign up to our newsletter, and follow us on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook so you always know where to find us.

As someone who spends a significant portion of their life inside of the internet, I can tell you with a great degree of certainty that unravelling pop culture mysteries is now a journalistic pursuit of its very own. It’s the kind of thing many people take umbrage at — shoutout to the inevitable ‘JOURNALISM IS DEAD, WATERGATE IS THE ONLY THING THAT MATTERS’ punters in the comments section — but for others, it’s extremely important work.

People need to know who made the ‘John Howard DJs like a mad cunt’ meme so they can be commended accordingly. It’s important to be across why Susan was killed off Seinfeld so abruptly, or why *NSYNC had a star in their name or what Amy Sherman-Palladino’s infamous final four words of the Gilmore Girls will be. In a culture that allows us to access all the world’s information so instantaneously, there’s something so niggling about these anomalies which slip through the cracks of intense fandom. We live in a world in which writers solicit podcast hosts to track down why Britney Spears was walking around with their little-read book nearly a decade ago — and, better yet, the podcast succeeds.

Now, fellow internet freaks, I hope you all have the adequate context to appreciate this: the deeply admirable story of how an intrepid reporter tracked down Ugly Naked Guy from Friends.

“A little more than a year ago, I stumbled into what has since become the single most important investigative quest in my long career as an internet content creator: finding the Ugly Naked Guy,” Todd van Luling, a senior staff writer with The Huffington Post, wrote in the above opus he published today.

“As a viral content creator, I decided it was my calling to solve this heroically inane mystery. Along the way, I felt like the 2016 internet equivalent of Herman Melville’s Captain Ahab, losing my mind as monomania overtook me bit by bit. But now, as Spring and new life is once again upon us all, my mind can rest with the knowledge that this quest didn’t swallow me whole.”

I highly recommend you read the whole thing, but here’s the gist: over the course of the past year, Van Luling traversed the depths of IMDb, Wikia, Reddit, Yahoo Answers, and social media to get answers about who played this character who briefly featured in two episodes of Friends 18 years ago. He pressed casting directors to sort through old files, forced denials from popular suspects, and repeatedly spoke to those involved with the show — all to no avail.

Series creator David Crane and David Schimmer (the only person to actually share a scene with the actor) were of no help. A vague description from a crew member led to Van Luling seeking the services of a police sketch artist. Then, eventually, a tip off came from a casting agency and he found his man.

573cd81c1600002a00f93ce9

SWEET VICTORY.

“There’s only one Ugly Naked Guy, man, and that was me,” said the exceedingly proud Ugly Naked Guy (aka actor Jon Haugen). “It was the best time in my life. I was the man.” Haugen then goes on to make polite conversation about how he enjoyed his time on set, was actually wearing boxers the whole time, and would happily come back for some kind of reunion. However, the most satisfying resolution comes from Van Luling himself.

“I had completed this mission as best as I ever would,” he wrote, presumably while solemnly placing his well-worn trilby on the hatstand of the New York HuffPo office. “Through the windows to the South, I could see only the buildings that blocked a view of the Statue of Liberty, the marker next to where my Irish ancestors once passed through to make a better life for themselves and subsequent generations of our family in this country.

“If I had had a better view, I imagine I could have seen the high-watermark of a wave before it broke and rolled back toward the ocean. I looked above me, not to the heavens, but to Facebook’s New York City headquarters just a few stories away. ‘All in a year’s work…’ I thought to myself (or potentially millions depending on how many people click on and share this post). ‘I hope I made you proud.'”

At long last, we can all sleep soundly tonight.

–

Read the full piece here.