If you’re unlucky enough to be asked by a friend to help them move, someone may eventually be unable to resist and shout, “Spin it!” Spin it! Spin it!”, in the style of Ross Geller as Couch Step Foreman. It’s one of the everyday moments that redefined “Friends” (available in full on HBO Max). The list is long: leather pants, taking a break, fake white teeth, “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” – don’t sing it to a Hollywood superstar monkey – or self-tanning. And Monica, Chandler and Joey are probably the first people you think of after being stung by a jellyfish. A few days ago I described So Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara as “a book to keep in the freezer.” I don’t know if Harold Bloom would have thought the concept was valid, but the person I was talking to was overwhelmed when he thought of Cujo and Little Women. He knew what I meant.
Some of these moments were remembered on social media following the death of Matthew Perry. During an impromptu vigil of sorts, thousands of fans of the show revealed the gags Perry’s character used to make them laugh. It seemed obligatory to thank both Chandler and the series for the good moments, of which there were so many they wouldn’t fit on a laminated list. The desire increased. In contrast to the followers of the current series, we were never able to create the trend topic #medialangosta, #unagi or #copageller. “Friends” stayed on screen for a decade, but it stayed with us for a lifetime.
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In the early 1990s, NBC was looking for a product that would rejuvenate its target audience, and two young screenwriters, Marta Kauffman and David Crane, came up with an idea about six twenty-somethings. They were supported by the hilarious Keep Dreaming, one of HBO’s first comedies, a love song to television that unfortunately isn’t on any platform. This project was eventually called “Friends” and premiered on September 22, 1994 – it reached Spain via Canal+ and was encrypted in November 1997. The reviews were good, but the reception was not enthusiastic. It was already a phenomenon in the second season. More than 53 million viewers saw the Superbowl episode. His success developed slowly in the heat of the relationship between Rachel and Ross, the breathing space that might not have existed, the girl with the photocopier and the 18-page letter (on both sides!). The pair became an obsession: Kauffman knew what they had accomplished when his rabbi asked him when they would return. Veteran director James Burrows always knew this. After reading the first script, he invited the actors to Las Vegas, gave them money for a bet and assured them that this would be the last time they would remain anonymous.
Those who took to social media to mourn Perry’s death were not an army of nostalgic 50-somethings. On the contrary, those in their 30s and even those in their 20s prevailed. Something that surprises even its creators. “It amazes me not only that people continue to see it, but also that they continue to identify with it,” Marta Kauffman confessed in 2016. “I have a 17-year-old daughter, and recently someone at her school asked her, ‘Have Have you seen this new series called Friends?
This is what happens when the characters are well written. That’s why we can identify with the experiences of four retirees from Miami or a group of New York publicists from the 1950s. Despite the tendency of some executives to artificially infuse fiction with characters of all ages and situations, there is universality. The problems of Friends’ protagonists are timeless: they fall in love, break up, have bad jobs, get promotions and sometimes dress up as armadillos. The fact that Netflix paid Warner 100 million in 2018 to run for a year is a testament to the enduring appeal of the series.
David Schwimmer and Jennifer Aniston in “Friends.”
There is no single secret to its success, but the most obvious is the chemistry between its protagonists, a group of brilliant actors who highlight the diverse personalities that Kauffman and Crane have created. Their various combinations worked, as did the mix of physical comedy – the moving scene could have appeared in any of Harold Lloyd’s slapstick – and the agility of the dialogue. He also knew how to exploit another of his virtues, the obvious physical attractiveness of his protagonists, and integrated the unresolved sexual tension that had given us so much pleasure in “Moonlight” or “Remington Steele”. Their episodes were self-contained, but we couldn’t lose track because, like Kauffman’s rabbi, we had to know what would happen to Ross and Rachel.
It is inevitable that dark clouds will fly overhead. They always lurk when you look at a cultural product of the past through the eyes of the present. Relentless revisionism accuses her of homophobia and racism. The makers took up the gauntlet at the long-awaited reunion in 2021, where, excusatio non petita, a group of young people who welcomed all diversity made amends to the series of absurd allegations. It’s not true that all gangs of the 1990s, even those of today, had the kind of racial and sexual diversity the lack of which makes “Friends” ugly. More unreal than the fact that the six protagonists of Friends are heterosexual is the fact that Melrose Place’s Matt, an attractive gay man from Los Angeles, was the most chaste character in his gang. Aaron Spelling’s series is the great science fiction series of the nineties, not The X-Files. In the mid-nineties, the wedding between Susan and Carol was an unprecedented event in fiction outside of the much freer cable television. And no, it wasn’t that obvious to serve chicken breast.
The six protagonists of “Friends”.
There were other groups of friends on American television that they were compared to. There was the dysfunctional gang from Seinfeld, who were much more cynical and tough, or the regulars from Cheers, the place where everyone knew your name. Friends had conversations about nothing for some and a second home for others, replacing a dimly lit basement with one of those cozy cafes that Starbucks, another 1990s phenomenon, had recreated around the world with its 1990s furniture of yore and their colorful cups.
As comfortable as the orange chair at Central Perk and as soothing as the ever-steaming coffee, Friends is the epitome of comfort TV. A concept that no one has defined better than another television hero, Bojack Horseman: “For many people, life is just a long, hard kick in the urethra and sometimes coming home after a long day of being kicked comes.” the urethra, you just want to watch a show about good, nice people who love each other, where no matter what happens, everything will be okay after thirty minutes.” These are friends.
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