Courteney Cox can thank Borat for her relationship with Johnny McDaid

3 March 2022

Courteney Cox has Ed Sheeran, Isla Fisher and Sacha Baron Cohen to thank for her relationship with Johnny McDaid.

Courtney Cox reveals how a string of celebrity friends got her together with Johnny McDaid

The 57-year-old actress has been dating Snow Patrol star Johnny, 45, since 2013 and the pair met when Ed invited him along with a whole host of celebrity friends including Taylor Swift and Harry Styles to a gathering at her house before 'Borat' star Sacha intervened to get the pair to hook up.

Courteney recalled: "Ed said, ‘Can I have some friends over this week?’ And I said, 'Of course!' He invited Johnny, Gary Lightbody, both of them from Snow Patrol, Taylor Swift… some great musicians and they all came over and I had a fun group anyway: Sacha Baron Cohen, Isla Fisher, Jennifer [Aniston] was there, it was just one of these fun weekends."

Some of the famous faces spent the night at her house but the former 'Friends' actress was disappointed when they were swapping numbers but no-one asked for hers.

Speaking on the 'The Howard Stern Show' on SiriusXM , she added: "[I thought] this is worse than not getting nominated [for an Emmy for ‘Friends’] … and I remember seeing Johnny and going, ‘Oh wow, he’s really intense, he’s got those eyes and he was playing the piano and I thought, ‘He’s really, really handsome.'"

Johnny later happened to attend screening of 'Just Before I Go' - which Courteney had directed - along with his bandmate Gary and the 'Scream' star had to intervene when she overheard 'Hot Rod' star Isla Fisher encouraging a mutual friend to flirt with Johnny.

Courteney said: "And I went, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, Isla what are you doing? If anybody’s gonna try to flirt with Johnny – what’s wrong with me?!' Then Isla went up to to [her husband] Sacha [Baron Cohen] and said, 'Courteney wants to go out with Johnny."

The 'Borat star then went up to directly to the 'Chasing Cars' hitmakers and announced: "Hey, Courteney wants to f*** one of you from Snow Patrol and it’s not you, Gary!"