Lisa Kudrow, beloved for her role as Phoebe Buffay on Friends, returned to her alma mater Vassar College to deliver the 2010 commencement address. She told the winding story of her path from biology major to actress — a journey that included being told she was 'too big' for TV, being passed over for Saturday Night Live in favor of Julia Sweeney, and most devastatingly, being fired from Frasier after just two days of rehearsal. At her lowest moment, her friend Robin Schiff told her this line, and while Kudrow didn't believe it at the time, she never forgot it. Months later, nearly broke, she accepted a tiny uncredited role as 'Waitress' on Mad About You. That role led the show's writer to recommend her to David Crane, who was casting a new show about six twenty-somethings in a coffee house. That show became Friends. Even Jim Burrows, the director who had fired her from Frasier, later said: 'It's a good thing you got fired, or you wouldn't have been on this show.'