Canned laughter (1)Canned laughter (2)AlrightHa uh ahHa uh um, I'm not sure what to do with that right nowI am so sorry, I am so, so sorryIs Monica around, I have to ask her somethingI guess I gotta do what you tell meI'm a twinkieI'm still in love with youLook if nothing else, its always great when someone tells you they love youI'm going to use the phone, I gotta cancel those 5 giant teddy bears I sent to Emily, my god think of the massacreOh, ha ha ha(!)Alright, well next time you take a shower, think about the last thing I wash, and the first thing you washIts self cleaningOh no I did that for someone once, I'm not comfortable having that kind of power and control over someonePhoebesSay that to him and you're goldenRa, that's what I saidMaybe we should just tell your parents firstProbably some European goodbye thing he picked up in LondonFor the last time noAnd from now on you make all of my decisions for meGet out, get out JoeyDo you have any idea how painful it is to tell someone that you love them and not have them say it backI could eat some chickenMy parents are deadThat's it, you're not mad, I mean it must have been terribleThat sucksWhat the hell was that?Why can't we use the same toothbrush, but we can use the same soap? Because soap is soapYou are such an idiotYou're the bossFriends is one of the most successful sitcoms worldwide. By the end of the series the six main cast members were each paid US$1,000,000 per episode. Advertisements during the series finale, which attracted an audience of over 52 million viewers, cost $2,000,000 for a 30-second spot in the United States and CAD$190,000 in Canada. The last episode was released on DVD 5 days after its broadcast.
The show focused on the lives of a group of six friends: spoiled Daddy's girl Rachel Green; compulsively clean chef Monica Geller; wise-cracking, perennially unlucky-in-love, underconfident office drone Chandler Bing; oversexed, clueless actor Joey Tribbiani; divorced paleontologist nerd Ross Geller; and scatterbrained hippie, masseuse, and aspiring folk singer/songwriter Phoebe Buffay. As the pilot begins, Rachel leaves her fiancé Barry at the altar and moves in with her childhood best friend, Monica. The pair lives across the hall from Chandler and Joey. They hang out with Monica's brother, Ross – who recently divorced his lesbian wife – and Phoebe, the "free spirit" of the bunch and Monica's old roommate. The settings for the show include Monica's apartment, Chandler and Joey's apartment and the coffee shop downstairs, "Central Perk".
After cutting herself off from her father's money, Rachel got her first job as a waitress in the coffee shop and later becomes a personal shopper at Bloomingdale's, then a buyer for Ralph Lauren. Monica struggled for the first several seasons for success, and later became head chef at a well-respected restaurant. Chandler eventually switched to a career in advertising by the last few seasons. After on-and-off success as a soap opera actor Joey's career eventually stabilized with a regular part on a soap opera from which he was initially fired earlier in the series' run. Paleontologist Ross eventually becomes a college professor. Phoebe ekes out a living as a singer-songwriter and a masseuse.
A constant story line throughout the series was the on-again/off-again romance between Ross and Rachel, and later in the series, the developing relationship between Chandler and Monica.
The show's theme song, "I'll Be There For You" by The Rembrandts, became a major hit after a Tennessee disc jockey looped it into a full length track and played it on the radio. The band's record label required them to write additional material and re-record the track as a full-length song, which peaked on the Billboard chart at #17.