So no-one told you life was gonna be this way,
Your job's a joke,
You're broke,
Your love life's DOA
It's like you're always stuck in second gear
and it hasn't been your day, your week, your month
or even your year....
CAUTION - THIS NODE MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS
Friends has been a flagship programme of Warner Brothers since it was first aired on NBC in September 1994. Based in central New York, the show revolves around the lives, friendships and relationships of six twenty-somethings (thirty-somethings towards this, the ninth series). The majority of the scenes are based within the two apartments belonging to Monica and Chandler (originally Monica and Rachel's apartment), Joey (orginally Joey and Chandler's apartment) which are across the hall from each other and their local coffee house in Greenwich Village called "Central Perk".
Across the alley from Monica and Chandler is Monica's hapless brother Ross, joined by his on-off love, Rachel. Rounding out the circle of friends is Monica's ex-roommate, Phoebe Buffay, an offbeat, eternally optimistic folk singer and massage therapist.
Monica: Rach, it's the Visa card people.
Rachel: Oh, God, ask them what they want.
Monica: Could you please tell me what this is in reference to? ...Yes, hold on.
Monica: Um, they say there's been some unusual activity on your account.
Rachel: But I haven't used my card in weeks!
Monica: That is the unusual activity.
Since its debut season, Friends has received 44 Emmy Award nominations, including four for Outstanding Comedy Series. The cast won a Screen Actors Guild Award in 1996 for Outstanding Ensemble Performance in a Comedy Series and has been nominated four times (1996, 1997, 1998 and 2002) for a Golden Globe Award for Best Television Series, Musical or Comedy. Friends also won the People's Choice Award for Favorite New Comedy Series in its first season, and has since won twice more as Favorite Comedy Series.
The series was created by the writing team of Marta Kauffman and David Crane. Emmy and CableACE Award-winning producer Kevin S. Bright is executive producer with Kauffman and Crane. Scott Silveri, Shana Goldberg-Meehan, Andrew Reich and Ted Cohen also serve as executive producers. Friends is a Bright/Kauffman/Crane Production in association with Warner Bros. Television.
Two CDs of the music from the series have been released. The first, simply titled "Friends" was released in 1995, the second, titled "Friends Again" was released in 2002. Both albums contain versions of the theme song as well as full tracks of some of the background songs used in the series along with snippets of some of the more famous lines from the cast. Along with the CDs, the series has also spawned a great many books, calendars, coffee cups, t-shirts and other such merchandise such as is seen with many other popular series.
Main Characters
Minister: Friends. Family. We are gathered to celebrate here today
the joyous union of Ross and Emily. Now Ross, repeat after me. I Ross...
Ross: I Ross...
Minister: Take thee, Emily...
Ross: Take thee, Rachel...Emily.
Monica's brother. With a PhD in paleontology, Ross Geller is very much the "sensible" figure in the group. He has had a crush on Rachel Green since High School, where he was seen as just Monica's geeky older brother. He is generally quiet and shy, thinking things through before he says them - although occasionally things slip out. He has been married and divorced three hapless times. The first marriage ended when his wife declared she was a lesbian, the second after Ross said Rachel's name at the altar and the third was a drunken marriage to Rachel in Las Vegas. He has two children, Ben, by Susan (his first wife) and Emma by Rachel.
Significant relationships
Carol
Julie
Emily Waltham
Elizabeth
Rachel Green
Jill Green
Mona
Occupation - paleontologist for a museum in New York.
Ross: Monica categorizes her towels.
How many categories are there?
Joey: Everyday use...
Chandler: Fancy...
Joey: Guest...
Chandler: Fancy Guest...
Ross: Two seconds!
Joey: Uh, uh... Eleven!
Ross: Amazing. Eleven is correct!
Ross Geller's sister, the bossy, anally retentive mother of the group. Her mother rarely approves of her and we often see her desperately trying for one-upmanship against Ross. At High School, Monica was the teased, obese girl, which may have influenced her decision to become a chef. Again, not having much luck with men, she has been out with an older man and a millionaire. However, she met her match in Chandler and they are now married.
Significant Relationships
Alan
Ethan
Richard Burke (Tom Selleck)
Pete Becker
Chandler Bing
Occupation - from assistant chef to restaurant critic, Monica has always worked with food.
Chandler: Sometimes I wish I was a lesbian.
...Did I say that out loud?
The sarcastic joker, who's smoking days still haunt him. Poor Chandler didn't have much luck with the women - thoughout the first four series we see him struggle to shake off Janice. However, his luck seems to turn when he falls in love with Monica and moves in with her, eventually marrying her. Chandler's mother writes romance novels and his father is a drag act in Las Vegas, all of which adds up to be very embarrassing for him.
Significant Relationships
Janice
Aurora
Jade - who was originally looking for Bob
Joanna - Rachel's boss at Bloomingdale's
Kathy - originally Joey's girlfriend
Marjorie
Monica Geller
Occupation - Chandler works in data reconfiguration and statistical factoring, he was promoted to manager in the first series which led him to quit his job, only to take it back when he realised that it was what defined him. In the final series, we see him take over an office in Tulsa.
Joey and Chandlers' apartment has been robbed
Joey: Aw, man! He took the five of spades!
looks through deck
Joey: No, here it is.
Joey lives across the hall from Chandler and Monica, in the apartment that he used to share with Chandler. Although seemingly slow witted and only interested in sex, Joey is actually a deeply sensitive man - although he hasn't had a lasting relationship. Joey's big break as an actor came when he landed the role of Dr Drake Remoray in Days of Our Lives.
Significant Relationships
Ursula
Erika
Kate
Janine
Occupation - Actor with mixed fortunes. He has temped from Chandler, worked as a tutor for a soap opera acting class and worked as Al Pacino's butt double. However, at the moment, he has found success as Dr Drake Remoray.
Monica: I'm Rachel! I love Ross! I hate Ross! I love Ross! I hate Ross!
Rachel: I'm Monica! I can't get a boyfriend so I'll stumble across the hall
and sleep with the first guy I find there!
Rachel comes from a well-to-do background, where Daddy paid for everything. She was cut off, however, when she ran from her marriage to Barry the orthodontist who she realised would lie and cheat all the way through their marriage. It takes her a while to settle in to not having all this money behind her but when she does, she takes to her independence well. She has lived with Monica for the majority of the series, however, she now lives with Ross, after a brief stint as Joey's flatmate. Rachel's parents get divorced after her mother reveals that she envies Rachel's free life, having married a Barry of her own. Rachel has been married once, to Ross, as a result of a drunken incident in Las Vegas; More recently she has had a child, Emma Geller-Green, by Ross.
Significant relationships
Barry Farber (in the pilot episode his surname is given as Finkel)
Paolo
Russ
Ross Geller
Danny
Joshua
Occupation - Originally an up and coming version of an American IT girl, Rachel found a job at Central Perk as a waitress before working at Bloomingdale's. She's now settled, working at Ralph Lauren.
Phoebe: What if the husband person is the wrong guy, and
you are the right guy. I mean you don't get chances
like this all the time, if you don't meet her now, you're
gonna be kicking yourself when you're 80, which is hard to do,
and that's how you break a hip.
Phoebe is the spiritual, far-out member of the group - for instance, she believes that she has a friend who was reincarnated as a pencil. She sings songs of her own making in Central Perk, often with tragicomic themes. Her stepmother committed suicide, her father abandoned her when she was young and she is estranged from both her real mother and her twin sister - Ursula Pamela Buffay (of "Mad About You" fame). She has managed to reunite with her brother, Frank Jr., and was surrogate mother to his triplets. Phoebe currently lives on her own in her late grandmother's apartment.
Significant Relationships
Duncan (the gay, ice skating instructor that she married)
Tony
David, Scientist Guy
Roger, the psychiatrist
Ryan, Navy guy.
Gary
Parker
Mike
Occupation - A singer/songwriter/masseuse, Phoebe has also worked for Chandler and Monica.
Brief Synopsis
Series One
Ross is a recently divorced man, after his wife realised she was a lesbian. His ex-wife later gave birth to his first child, Ben. Halfway through the series, he is caught kissing Chandler's Mum by Joey.
Rachel runs away from her wedding day to Barry (who she later finds out went on their honeymoon with the bridesmaid, Mindy) and bumps into her old friend from High School, Monica. The pair become flatmates. She gets a job at Central Perk to help her make up the rent, but later in the season goes for an interview at Saks Fifth Avenue as an assistant buyer. Rachel also begins a relationship with Paolo, which ends after he makes a pass at Pheobe. Rachel's hapless relationships continue as she begins to date Barry once more (which is awkward as he is now engaged to Mindy).
Monica is working as a chef at the trendy restaurant, Iridium, on 65th and Broadway.
Season One also features Marcel the pet monkey who the gang all adore, until Ross had to send him to the zoo when he hit puberty.
Chandler receives a promotion at work to manager, after which he promptly quits, however, when he realises that the job was a defining part of who he was, he goes back. Some co-workers think that he's gay even though he has a girlfriend (Janice "Oh. MY. GAWD!") who he is trying desperately to break up with. He also gets stuck in an ATM vestibule with Victoria's Secret model Jill Goodacre.
Joey's acting career stumbles, although he has a few gigs. He stars as Pinocchio and Sigmund Freud in the musical "Freud!". He was also, perhaps most notably, the poster boy for VD. He also "acts" as a butt double for Al Pacino.
Pheobe is living with her Grandmother, learning aromatherapy and works as a masseuse and singer for Central Perk. We also meet Ursula Pamela Buffay (of "Mad about You"), Pheobe's twin sister, except that the two do not get along.
The majority of the first season focuses on Ross' crush on Rachel and how he should tell her. At the end of the season, Chandler lets it slip and she decides to give it a try.
Series Two
Ross has been madly in love with Rachel since the ninth grade. The second series begins with Rachel waiting at the airport for Ross to arrive back from China. She fully intends to tell him that she wants him too until he arrives with Julie in tow. When he found out that Rachel was interested in him (through Rachel drunkenly ringing him and telling him she was over him) he broke up with Julie but blew it with Rachel when the list of Rachel's pros and cons he made to help him decide between them fell into Rachel's hands. They eventually get over their differences after watching a video of Rachel and Monica's prom where it is clear how much Ross likes Rachel and the two became a couple.
Mr Heckles (the guy who lived beneath Rachel and Monica's apartment) dies and leaves all of his belongings to the pair.
Chandler and Joey babysit baby Ben for the day and lose him on a bus. At the end of the season, Chandler falls for a girl he met on the internet - who is none other than Janice.
Monica is dating Richard Burke (a friend of her father's), who is much older than her - they break up due to Monica wanting children and Richard feels that he is too old.
Pheobe married a Canadian gay ice-skating instructor before the series began and in Series Two we finally meet him. She also begins her search for her father after discovering that the pictures in her Grandmother's apartment are just the photos which come with the frames.
Joey finally gets a break as Dr Drake Remoray on Days of Our Lives until the writers kill him off later in the series.
Ross's ex-wife Carol and her lover Susan get married. Ross gives one of the brides (Susan) away.
Series Three
Ross and Rachel break up after her busy schedule and his | 
