Friends (TV series)

Producers Kevin Bright (b. 1955), David Crane (b. 1957), and Marta Kauffman (b. 1956)

Date Aired from September 22, 1994, to May 6, 2004

Using the ensemble cast format, Friends was a half-hour sitcom originally focused on the Generation X demographic. The cast and plotlines, however, appealed to both younger and older audiences, making the show a “must-see” event.

Friends was produced by Kevin Bright, David Crane, and Marta Kauffman, who had worked together on the Home Box Office (HBO) show Dream On, which focused on people who have already made their choices in life and are struggling to figure out how to live with them. Friends focused on people who have yet to make these choices. The show was in part based on the experiences of all three executive producers, who lived in New York as twenty-somethings. In the planning stage, the show was first called “Insomnia Café.” The title shifted to “Six of One,” then “Across the Hall” and “Friends Like Us.” The final title, simply Friends, was decided about the time that the National Broadcasting Company (NBC) selected the show to run on Thursday nights at 8:30, preceding the hit series Seinfeld and immediately following another hit sitcom, Mad about You. Even with the advantageous placement, NBC only ordered twelve episodes, plus the pilot. However, because of strong writing and an appealing ensemble cast, the show was a hit and became an integral part of NBC’s “Must See TV.”

The six actors who made up the cast were basically unknown when the show was first broadcast in September 1994. Courteney Cox, playing the compulsively neat, overachieving Monica Geller, was the most well known of the cast members because of her role as Michael J. Fox’s girlfriend on Family Ties. Television audiences first met Lisa Kudrow, playing the eccentric, guitar-playing free spirit Phoebe Buffay, on Mad about You, where she played the ditzy waitress Ursula. Jennifer Aniston, as Rachel Green, was a new face to television audiences and an immediate hit as a spoiled Jewish American looking for love and a job. The men were David Schwimmer, playing the nerdy yet sensitive paleontologist Ross Geller, Monica’s brother; Matt LeBlanc, as the hunky but dim-witted struggling actor Joey Tribbiani; and Matthew Perry, as Chandler Bing, who has a regular job he hates. All are in their twenties and live in New York City in close proximity to one another. Rachel and Monica’s spacious apartment is a gathering place for the six, and Chandler and Joey share a bachelor pad across the hall; Ross has his own place, as does Phoebe. Their most frequented hangout is the coffeeshop Central Perk. Finding jobs, except for Chandler and Ross, is a source of plotlines and frustrations. However, paying the rent does not seem to be a concern.

Themes and Plotlines

In the early episodes, the relationships among the six are as friends only. Ross does have a longtime crush on Rachel, which fuels many plotlines. It is not until the fifth season (1998–99) that a serious relationship develops between Monica and Chandler that leads to their marriage. What the six friends become for one another is family. The theme song “I’ll Be There for You,” by the Rembrandts, echoes the support they provide. According to the executive producers, the show is about love, sex, careers, and possibilities, but it is also about these friends recreating a family to sustain themselves in a city where they are basically alone.

The show’s writers designed plots that ranged from the simple to the ridiculous to the serious. Story lines provided continuity and drew a devoted weekly audience. The on-again, off-again relationship between Ross and Rachel, for instance, including having a child together, captivated viewers through the show’s last episode on May 6, 2004. Ross’s attempt to be part of his son’s life, even though this means accepting that his ex-wife left him for another woman, brings in another aspect of extended family. Joey’s support of the pregnant Rachel, as well as Monica and Chandler’s desire to keep their developing love a secret, kept viewers emotionally committed to the show. End-of-season cliffhangers, such as Monica and Chandler getting together at Ross’s wedding, as well as Rachel’s pregnancy, helped maintain enthusiasm for the show during the summer hiatus.

The series also included guest artists, some playing recurring roles, such as Marlo Thomas as Rachel’s mother and Elliott Gould and Christina Pickles as Ross and Monica’s parents. That America loved the show was illustrated by the ratings; throughout its run, Friends was consistently in the top ten. The show and its actors were nominated for many awards and won Emmy Awards and Screen Actors Guild Awards in the 1990s. In 1996, the show won the Emmy for Outstanding Directing for a Comedy Series, and in 1998 Kudrow won the trophy for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series. Although the series maintained its popularity in the 1990s, it began to lose some of its audience in the next decade and went off the air in 2004. Friends continues to engage new viewers through syndication. Still, the show, its crew, and its actors (including guest actors) continued to earn Emmy nominations, with a total of sixty-two by the end of the series. In 2002, the show finally took home the Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series while Aniston earned the statue for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series that same year.

In 2016, Friends ranked twenty-sixth on Rolling Stone's list of the one hundred greatest television shows in history. Its enduring popularity continued to make it a valuable asset in the 2010s. Between 2015 and 2018, Netflix paid WarnerMedia $30 million annually to licenses episodes; amid growing competition, the digital streaming service then inked a $100 million deal to continue the arrangement through 2019 with AT&T, which had acquired WarnerMedia. In honor of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the series' premiere in 2019, twelve episodes considered fan favorites were screened in select theaters over the course of three nights nationwide; according to reports, the ticket sales from the event generated close to $3 million. Also in 2019, it was announced that WarnerMedia's new streaming service, HBO Max, had paid to take over the exclusive rights to all episodes of Friends.

Impact

Unlike other ensemble shows, Friends had no single, big star; each had his or her niche, and all became celebrities because of the show. Plotlines shifted from one character’s dilemmas to another’s, with each episode including all six stars. Friends became a regular part of many viewers’ lives. Rachel’s hairstyle, known as the Rachel, became popular with young women. The series became part of a new tradition of shows about young people sharing their lives with one another, yet the show was unique in that these six friends become family. Friends reached a wide, enthusiastic, and worldwide audience. As a snapshot of single twenty-somethings beginning their adult lives, Friends became part of popular culture.

In the 2020s came a reevaluation of the still-popular sitcom. Many, including some of its writers and its cocreator Marta Kauffman, have criticized the show's lack of diversity and instances of insensitivity. Former writer Patty Lin alleged that the actors deliberately and self-servingly forced rewrites. Perry's 2022 book Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing—a blunt, humorous addiction memoir—revealed that he had been high during the filming of some seasons of Friends, casting the show in a different light. Nevertheless, Friends remained among the most-viewed television programs in reruns and online streaming more than a quarter-century after its debut, and viewership spiked immediately after Perry's sudden death in October 2023.

Bibliography

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Koblin, John. “Reaction to Matthew Perry’s Death Shows Enduring Popularity of ‘Friends.’” The New York Times, 30 Oct. 2023, www.nytimes.com/2023/10/30/business/media/matthew-perry-friends-popularity.html. Accessed 16 Nov. 2023. ‌

Lee, Edmund. "Netflix Will Keep ‘Friends’ through Next Year in a $100 Million Agreement." The New York Times, 4 Dec. 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/12/04/business/media/netflix-friends.html. Accessed 20 May 2019.

Morris, Wesley. “‘Friends’ Is Turning 25. Here’s Why We Can’t Stop Watching It.” The New York Times, 5 Sept. 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/09/05/arts/television/friends-tv-show.html. Accessed 16 Nov. 2023. ‌

Peyser, Marc. “Losing Friends.” Newsweek, 6 Oct. 2003, pp. 46–53.

Sandell, Jillian. “I’ll Be There For You: Friends and the Fantasy of Alternative Families.” American Studies, vol. 39, no. 2, Summer 1998, pp. 141–155.

Sims, David. "HBO Max's Golden Ticket." The Atlantic, 17 July 2019, www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2019/07/hbo-maxs-golden-ticket-is-friends/594181. Accessed 5 Nov. 2019.

Thomashoff, Craig. “The Joy of Six.” People, 17 Apr. 1995, pp. 80–86.

Wild, David. “Friends.” Rolling Stone, 18 May 1995, pp. 62–69.