Chapter One: The One That Almost Wasn’t
1 If the name “Billy Dreskin” rings a bell, it’s because Kauffman and Crane would use it to name an off-screen character in Seasons One and Two. He’s first mentioned in “The One with Two Parts: Part 2,” where Monica tells Rachel’s father that, in high school, Rachel had sex with Billy Dreskin in her parents’ bed. The real-life Dreskin was a rabbi by this time, and apparently his congregation was none too thrilled about this shout-out.
2 Though not a win. “We were up against the Seinfeld masturbation episode,” Crane recalled. “It was, like, why are we here?”
3 Couples later reemerged as a television movie, which aired on ABC in July 1994.
4 “We were driving along—I think it was Beverly Boulevard—and we saw a place called the Insomnia Café,” explained Kauffman. “And I remember we were talking about [how] that would be a cool place to have one of our main sets... We liked the idea of something being overcaffeinated.”
5 A suggestion that came from David Crane’s partner, Jeffrey Klarik, a television writer-producer himself, who was working on Mad About You at the time.
6 It was indeed present in New York City, though. “The coffee shop on Friends was put together as a compilation of coffee shops I had visited and taken pictures of in Manhattan,” said Kevin Bright. “Just the little pieces of things—like there was one of those coffee shops that actually had a real wood bar as their coffee bar. So, we took that from there.”
7 According to Kauffman, the bright orange-red sofa was originally beige, before the network requested the change. Arguably, a very good note.
8 ABC had recently debuted a sitcom called These Friends of Mine, and the titles were deemed too similar. That show would later be retitled Ellen.
9 It’s worth noting that NBC did insist the writers revise an earlier script wherein Paul has an (unseen, unmentioned, but strongly implied) erection. In 1994, even an implied erection was a standards violation.
10 The episode was given this title after the fact. Originally, it was simply “The Pilot.”
Chapter Two: The One with Six Kids and a Fountain
11 It wasn’t quite as easy and glamorous as it sounds. Burrows sometimes tells a slightly different version of this story wherein he comes off sounding less like the Godfather and more like Dad. “These kids, they all wanna go to Vegas.” Moonves told him too bad, he couldn’t just lend him an airplane. Burrows countered, “I’ll pay for dinner.” Fine.
12 It would also be reflected in a popular promotional poster, featuring the cast in a poker-game setup, which graced many a bedroom wall in the 1990s.
13 Much more could be written about Arlene Colman-Schwimmer, a woman
who has devoted her career and personal life to the cause of feminism. Among other things, she was the leader of two women’s law associations, the original incorporator and chairperson of the National Women’s Political Caucus, and a former officer of NOW. In law school, she was one of seven women in a class of 349. “The criminal law professor called on the women only to recite the sex crimes—in order to embarrass us,” she later recalled. When she expressed interest in pursuing a criminal law career, she was told outright “to find a husband and have babies.” Colman-Schwimmer would go on to have a long and incredibly successful career as a divorce lawyer (one of the only “acceptable” specialties for a female lawyer at that time), and later started her own practice focusing on sex discrimination and family law.
14 Depending on your generation, you may know him best as the romantic lead of Ice Castles or the voice of the Beast in Disney’s animated feature Beauty and the Beast. He would later direct six episodes of the first three seasons of Friends.
15 Ever the charmer, Trudeau replied on Twitter: “I’ve been giving it some thought, and you know what, who hasn’t wanted to punch Chandler? How about a rematch @MatthewPerry?” To the internet’s great delight, Perry concluded the “incident” with a Chandler-style response: “I think I will pass at your request for a rematch, kind sir (given that you currently have an army at your disposal).”
16 Apparently, in 1987, it was still assumed we’d have replaced cars with hovercrafts by 2011.
17 In an incredibly bizarre coincidence, it is also known for having “predicted” Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s death. But that’s a whole other kettle of fish. For further reading, see the internet.
18 Again, the sitcom version of “the future” is one in which we’ve invented hovercrafts and learned to coexist with extraterrestrial beings, and yet we still have to deal with the same old bullshit at the airport.
19 Perry himself had adopted this cadence from his grade-school classmates Brian and Chris Murray (of the Justin Trudeau incident). “[They] were like, ‘Could that teacher be any meaner?’ And I was like, ‘Whoa. In twenty years, I’m gonna buy a Malibu house ’cause of that.’”
20 “Safe second” is a less official term, but just as necessary an evil as “second position,” and it’s exactly what it sounds like. Ex. A show about baggage handlers? Oh, sure, bring him in. He’s a safe second.
21 Translation: whether or not left-handed people are more likely to get cluster headaches.
22 A writer and producer herself, Newman would go on to win an Emmy for cowriting the landmark episode of Ellen in which DeGeneres’s character came out as a lesbian.
23 Kudrow’s own older sister, Helene, often played the stand-in for Kudrow during Phoebe-Ursula scenes.
24 Titled “The Wife,” this is the episode where Jerry’s girlfriend poses as his wife in order to use his discount at the dry cleaner’s. It may be better known as the episode where George gets caught peeing in the gym shower.
25 As ever, it wasn’t quite as glamorous as it sounds. Cox’s bread-and-butter jobs were things like book covers, where she’d sit and be illustrated into a spooky scene for the front of a paperback thriller. “But I loved it!” she said. “Because it was a good way to try to afford to live in New York City, which was not easy.”
26 Clips of this series are available on YouTube, if you’d like to surmise the network’s reasons for canceling it within a month. Personally, I think Wikipedia summary of the show’s premise says it best: “Larry returns home a decade after he was dragged off by baboons on his honeymoon. His wife, Sally, has now married another man and has a nine-year-old daughter. Larry falls in love with his former sister-in-law, Gabriella, who hates him.”
27 Leah Remini, who’d also been brought in to read for Monica, thought so, too. In her memoir, Troublemaker, she remembered leaving the audition and walking out to the parking lot with another actress: “We chatted on the way to our cars, wishing each other the best, and then we saw Courteney Cox walking toward us, then past us and right into the building. Motherfucker! We both knew it right away: she had the part of Monica.” Remini would later be a guest star in the “The One with the Birth.”
28 This village is now famous for two things: being the hometown of Matt LeBlanc, and having its own mysterious dialect of Massachusetts slang, called “Lake Talk.” Some theorize that Lake Talk is a combination of World War II military code and ancient Italian-Romany slang. It includes phrases like “cuya moi” (shut up) and “dikki ki dotti” (unbelievable). In 2014, LeBlanc demonstrated some Lake Talk on Conan, saying, for example: “We were down the corner the other day. There’s some quister jivals (pretty girls) down there, mush (dude).” This has nothing to do with anything; I just think it’s really cool that there’s a secret language known only to the people of one Massachusetts village, and Matt LeBlanc happens to be one of them.
29 “Welcome back to the world! Grab a spoon!”
30 The character originated by Jennifer Grey in the film. Grey later appeared as Rachel’s estranged best friend and would-be maid of honor, Mindy, in “The One with the Evil Orthodontist.”
31 A role he originated in 1985 and, as of this writing, is still playing.
32 There was a brief moment of panic when, out of the blue, David Crane got a call from an NBC executive who told him she’d offered the role to Jami Gertz (best known for films like The Lost Boys, Less Than Zero, and, later, Twister). “We held our breath for twenty-four hours until she passed,” said Crane, adding that Gertz was a wonderful actress, “but not Rachel.”
33 Lisa Whelchel, who’d played Blair on The Facts of Life, said she was asked to come in for Rachel during this period. She remembered telling her husband after reading the pilot script, “This is the funniest script I have ever read and this is going to be a huge hit.” But she felt that acting on the show would conflict with her Christian beliefs, and so declined the opportunity, saying, “I can tell it’s going to be just all about, you know, sex.”
Chapter Three: The One with Marcel and George Clooney
34 The den mother as James Burrows suggests. “The pilot is very ‘Monica’s Kids.’”
35 Schwimmer and Perry also confessed they had preconceived notions about LeBlanc, based on his looks and his modeling career. “I was, like, ‘This guy’s kind of a dick,’” Schwimmer told Entertainment Weekly in 1995. “I thought, ‘Oh, great, here’s this guy I’m going to work with for maybe five years, and he’s fucking Joe Cool stud.’” Realizing perhaps that he was being kind of a dick himself, Schwimmer added, “Well, he’s turned me around completely.”
36 Joey’s real turning point in this season is “The One with Two Parts,” in which he dates and is dumped by Ursula, Phoebe’s twin sister. It highlights his friendship with Phoebe, but it also allows us to see him heartbroken—alerting us to the fact that he does have a heart.
37 Sam and Diane are “hate-fuckers,” argues journalist Taffy Brodesser-Akner. “Hate-fuckers are good for a one-liner, but they tend to suck all the joy out of the room as we debate if their insults and bickering and overall disdain for each other is something enjoyable to be around. It is not.”
38 Except for Seinfeld’s characters, who were miraculously spared. The Seinfeld team didn’t want to participate in the blackout stunt, and since Seinfeld could pretty much do whatever it wanted at this point, there were at least a few blocks of Upper Manhattan that still had power that night.
39 “What is this place?” Jamie asks, looking around as if she’s wandered into a mosh pit instead of a coffee shop. It’s a one-minute cameo that sums up everything about the difference between Friends and Mad About You. Jamie’s only a few years older than the Friends, but she is a Baby Boomer, while they’re all solidly Generation X. Jamie lives on Fifth Avenue and 12th Street—maybe a ten-minute walk from Central Perk, but a very different neighborhood. She’s a character created in 1992, before coffee was cool. She makes coffee at home, like the married, professional, grown-up she is, then she puts on a blazer and goes to work. No wonder she’s baffled by this funky living-room-cum-café full of kids just sitting there, being.
40 In the early years, everyone was curiously divided on this point. Friends was either smut or sterile, according to the critics. They clutched their pearls over this group of men and women talking about sex together, but rolled their eyes over the fact that they didn’t actually do it. Hmm.
41 In ten years of interviews, this remained the number-one gripe among the cast. Marcel was played by two monkeys, who everyone agreed were the all-time worst guest performers on the show. The reasons are obvious, but still, that’s really saying something considering this series also featured infants, children, chickens, ducks, and dozens of movie stars.
Chapter Four: The One Where Two Women Got Married
42 In all but one episode. Carol was originally played by Anita Barone, in “The One with the Sonogram” at the end. She left Friends shortly thereafter and joined The Jeff Foxworthy Show.
43 Like Billy Dreskin, Deb and Rona get their own little shout-out. “Who should we call first, your folks or Deb and Rona?” Susan asks Carol in “The One with the Dozen Lasagnas” back in Season One.
44 I’m deliberately referring to gay, lesbian, and bisexual people rather than everyone under the LGBTQ umbrella, because DADT only applied to them. The military had banned candidates with what it referred to as “behavior disorders,” including “transvestism” in 1963, and that ban would remain in place until President Barack Obama lifted it in 2015.
45 She’s the woman who overhears Phoebe say, “I miss Rose,” assumes that Rose is an ex-girlfriend, and swoops in to buy Phoebe a drink.
46 O’Connell references The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt character, Mikey, as the quintessential example: Mikey works in construction, is obsessed with sports, says dopey things in a Queens-Italian accent—he’s basically Joey 2.0. “This construction worker that just happens to like guys,” says O’Connell. “That fuckin’ person feels so false to me. But I know Jack. Honey, I know Jack.”
47 Ron Kelly, the VP and general manager of KJAC, issued a statement saying: “We do not believe the episode of Friends meets prevailing standards of good taste in our community.” Instead, he said, they would air a preview of the Super Bowl.
Chapter Five: The One Where We All Got the Haircut
48 The writers gave her a fitting send-off by pairing her up with another temporary character thrown in to keep Ross and Rachel apart: Russ. Yeah, remember Russ? Ross’s doppelgänger, also played by David Schwimmer with a bunch of facial prosthetics? That was one of those things that didn’t work.
49 Klosterman echoes this sentiment: “Go back and look at the paper in 1996 or 1997. The things people were worried about were, like, ‘Are shark attacks on the increase?’”
50 Which was also a much whiter, predominantly male workforce. Generation X included significantly more women, people of color, and immigrants in its labor force. JUST SAYING.
51 That same night, Lea Thompson (the titular star of Caroline in the City) bumped into Chandler and Joey babysitting Ben in “The One with the Baby on the Bus.” Thompson’s show was nowhere near as big as Friends, but she herself was arguably a bigger celebrity than any of the Friends cast at that point.
52 It’s available online now. I dare you to get through it.
53 As the New York Times called it back then, an “area” that could be found “on line” on “the Coca-Cola World Wide Web site.” Bless their hearts.
54 Translation: the show that comes on after the Super Bowl. Aside from the game itself, Super Bowl lead-outs are usually some of the most-watched TV shows of any given year.
Chapter Six: The One After “The One After the Super Bowl”
55 Reportedly, $75,000 per episode for Season Three, $85,000 for Season Four, $100,000 for Season Five, and $120,000 for Season Six. I know.
56 The one exception is the Billy Crystal/Robin Williams appearance in “The One with the Ultimate Fighting Champion.” They turn up in the opener, have a funny conversation, and then vanish. It makes no sense, but at least they’re funny. (Sorry, Jean-Claude.)
57 Aniston shot Picture Perfect during the summer of 1996, when her hair was still very shaggy. It came out a year later, and everyone who didn’t get The Rachel the first time around suddenly rediscovered it. That haircut wasn’t going anywhere.
58 With the other four hiding in Monica’s bedroom, eating organic leg wax. It’s a silly setup, but really, any comic relief will do in this bruiser of an episode.
Chapter Seven: The One Where They All Go to London
(And Everywhere Else in the World)
59 I’m not even going to get into the whole Frank-and-Alice thing, because, really, what is there to say? They hooked up when he was a high-school student and she was his home economics teacher. You can just file that under Storylines That Would Not Fly Today.
60 You’ll notice Rachel is wearing the same outfit in both “The One with All the Haste” and the following episode, “The One with the Wedding Dresses.” As if Rachel would ever repeat an outfit.
61 Bright, who directed the episode, said his favorite part is not the contest but the scene where Phoebe gives a pep talk to the embryos at the doctor’s office. He and his wife had struggled with infertility, and his own children were conceived via IVF a few years prior, he later explained. “And the ability to take a step back and have a laugh about it is a really incredible thing.”
62 Schwimmer was also eager to wrap up this storyline. Years later, he referred to it as the one thing he would have changed about Ross’s trajectory. “I would not have allowed myself to be persuaded to have Ross marry and divorce again,” he told the Telegraph. “The whole arc of the relationship was weird then, because for him to be able to move on enough to marry someone else and then go back to being in love with Rachel later just went a bit too far.”
63 Unlike certain other pairings within the group, but let’s not talk about that now.
Chapter Eight: The One Where Everything Changed
64 It’s actually not just my opinion. This episode was nominated for numerous awards, and is widely cited as Friends’ peak, both by cultural critics and internet polls. And if the internet says so, it must be right.
65 Ross’s situation may seem just as ridiculous as the one happening across the street, but as anyone who’s navigated the New York rental market will tell you, this is fairly standard mania.
66 As recently as 2016, Cox mentioned the famous “Jennifer Salad” that Aniston made for them, when the group appeared on a tribute to James Burrows. Aniston waved it off, saying, “Oh, stop. I tossed it.”
67 Aka the greatest product-placement device in television history. In 2004, Patrick Connolly (the chief marketing officer of parent company Williams-Sonoma) called the episode “the gift that keeps on giving. The phones light up with catalog requests every time it airs.” Congrats, Pottery Barn. Hope you’re enjoying that Friends money.
68 Even in this episode, where Ross and Carol invite her over for a threesome, in an effort to spice up their nonexistent sex life. Susan comes in, rips off her jacket, and gives Carol a great, big hug. Apparently, a group-sex storyline is A-okay at this point, but not two women kissing.
69 This was not a scripted scene, either. While shooting the what-if episode, Cox was waiting for the rest of the cast to come onto the stage. “Kevin Bright put on ‘Shake Your Groove Thing’ and I just grabbed a doughnut and started dancing like crazy in front of the audience,” she later said. “God, playing Fat Monica was so freeing!...I could do anything because I was hidden under all that prosthetic makeup.”
70 Or been fired or forced out. That’s a whole other story, and if you’d like to read it, I suggest you pick up both Littlefield’s own book, Top of the Rock, as well as Bill Carter’s Desperate Networks.
71 Though this show, too, was criticized for not explicitly identifying characters as Jewish. Seinfeldia author Jennifer Keishin Armstrong wrote that, “as the series gained more viewers, the criticisms mounted: too Jewish. Not Jewish enough. Even ‘too self-hatingly Jewish,’” according to some critics.
72 For clarity’s sake, I’m referring to her as “Chandler’s dad” or her stage name, Helena Handbasket. That’s how the character was identified in the show, and how she was referred to in research materials and by my interview subjects. I’m using “she” as a pronoun.
Chapter Nine: The One Where Nobody Died
73 The original scenes were eventually added as a special feature on the DVD collection.
74 Three guesses which one they called “difficult” and which one they called “a leader.” I’ll wait.
Chapter Ten: The One Where It Ended, Twice
75 Which began with the infamous fifth-season episode of Happy Days, wherein Fonzie quite literally jumps over a shark on water skis.
76 Cough, Janine, cough.
77 Connie Wang, who is Chinese-American, echoed this sentiment. In addition to Friends, she said, “I was also watching shows, like Moesha. So, it was all black families, or all black friends.” Because she was watching these shows as a child in an all-white community, she got the message: “Black people only hang out with black people. White people hang out with white people.” Aside from the short-lived All-American Girl, “there was nothing like that for Asians,” Wang said. “But if there was one, Asian people would only hang out with Asian people, and that’s how I thought it was.”
78 “One of the biggest changes in media, in my life, is this shift toward taking television as seriously as we take it now,” Chuck Klosterman told me. “Things like ‘appointment TV’—no one would have ever said that in 1994. It would have seemed insane. Television was what you watched when there was nothing else to do.”
79 Sherri Shepherd also had a small (nonromantic) role in a Joey-Ross storyline, in Season Four’s “The One with Phoebe’s Uterus.” Joey becomes a tour guide at the museum where Ross works. Shepherd, another guide, explains to him that the “white coats” (scientists) and “blue blazers” (tour guides) can’t sit together in the cafeteria. It’s an unspoken rule. The story culminates with Ross whipping off his white coat and calling for integration at last: “I say we shed these coats that separate us and get to know the people underneath!” It is a spot-on example of mainstream attitudes about diversity in the ’90s: it’s brief, it’s all about “color blindness,” and it’s explained by white people. Thankfully, Shepherd steals the show so hard that the storyline is not nearly as memorable as her cameo. “I GAVE YOU MY SNACK PACK!”
80 That year, the cast decided (as a group, naturally) to submit themselves in the Lead Actor and Actress categories. Until then, they’d submitted as Supporting performers, but, as Matthew Perry joked at the ceremony, “It didn’t work out too well for us.” Kudrow was the only one who’d won.
81 Hence, “The One Where Chandler Gets Caught.”
82 Both of those concepts would later emerge among the many Friends conspiracy theories online.
83 Which is, to be fair, a pretty absurd scenario. Here, I’d like to point out that the writers did know when they were pushing the boundaries of reality. “There’s a lot of debate that goes on as to how much can you credibly believe,” Crane explained. “And you have a lot of leeway...within the conventions and the tone of the show, and sitcoms.” They knew it was unrealistic, but they also knew audience did not expect grounded reality from Friends. “We’re not making a documentary here.”
Chapter Eleven: The Comeback
84 Nor did this “curse” seem to work on the cast of Seinfeld. Just ask Julia Louis-Dreyfus, if you can find her under that pile of Emmys.
85 Barr herself proved more than “polarizing” in 2018, thanks to her Twitter presence. After a particularly overt racist tweet, the reboot was canceled and the concept retooled into a new show, without her.