Amy and I were definitely one of the many who made it a point of being home on Thursday evenings to watch the latest episode. It kind of became a yearly tradition to tune in to the premiere episode to see if they finally succumbed to outside pressure and changed their theme song (and each year, I thought they couldn't possibly resist Rembrandt backlash again).
I started thinking about making this list, and immediately came up with the list of moments I wanted to put in it. Full disclosure: Amy and I own the DVDs and have cycled through them multiple times, so I think I'm fairly well-versed in the lore. Here, then, are the ten bits that consistently make me laugh, even after more than a decade, in no particular order:
1. Early on in the series, Joey starred in a stage production called "Freud!" and forced his friends to come to it. Not only is the idea of a musical biography of Sigmund Freud funny in and of itself, it contained a song explaining the famous psychoanalyst’s theory of penis envy, accompanied by the most inept soft-shoe routine ever performed. Basically any show that Joey performed in was great (e.g. "I'm gonna get on this spaceship, and go to Blargon-7 in search of alternative fuels."), as you'll see as you get further into this list.
2. Anytime Phoebe yells is hilarious to me, since she's such a laid-back character, but the best one is when she references a so-far-unmentioned roommate named Denise. When no one else knows who she's talking about, Phoebe says she talks about her all the time, and finally storms out of the coffee shop screaming, "NO ONE EVER LISTENS TO ME!"
3. While helping Joey rehearse for an episode of his robot-buddy-cop series "Mack and C.H.E.E.S.E.", Ross and Phoebe try to help him run his lines, and in the process prove themselves even worse actors than Joey himself. Ross, taking the part of the show's villain, over-enunciates his lines, including the immortal "That'll be a neat trick, when you're--" (glances at script) "--when you're DEAD!" Say what you will about Ross being the most annoying character on the show (something I tend to agree with), but as an actor, David Schwimmer consistently makes left-field acting choices that I find really entertaining. Drunk Ross has several moments that just barely avoided making this list.
4. Some moments go by so fast that you don't even notice them until the third or fourth time around. Case in point, the episode where Monica refuses to admit that she's extremely sick. Everyone else can see that she's feverish, lethargic and stuffed up, but she keeps insisting "I'm fine!", completely unable to make that last word sound like anything other than "find". The first time she says it, watch her face as she reacts to what she's just said. For the briefest of instances, she makes what is perhaps the strangest face a human has ever made on television, then goes right back to normal. It's awesome.
5. Another joke that I didn't catch until after multiple views is the episode where Phoebe finds out that her twin sister Ursula has become a porn star, which starts to bring Phoebe a lot of unwanted attention. Later, we get to see a brief clip of one of Ursula's films -- "Bouffay the Vampire Layer" -- which involves a lot of latex, hair spray and black drapes. The dialogue is all hilariously bad, but at one point Ursula calls her vaguely Dracula-resembling co-star "Nosfera-tool". Subtle, but hilarious. (Honorable mention: In this same episode, Chandler can't understand why people cry at sad movies. Given the example of Bambi's mother dying, he sarcastically quips, "Yes, it was very sad when the man stopped drawing the deer.")
6. The only moment I have to include here that wasn't actually enacted by any of the Friends comes from when Rachel goes to get an ultrasound of her and Ross's unborn child (12-year old spoiler alert!). Earlier, Phoebe has contributed two possibilities to the baby-name pool -- "Phoebe for a girl, Phoebo for a boy." Later on, Rachel mentions these names to her obstetrician when asking if they'll be able to tell the sex of the baby. They can't yet, but the doctor deadpans as she leaves, "I know it's not my place, but please don't name your child Phoebo."
7. As I said before, I'm biased toward Joey's acting jobs when it comes to picking out classic moments, and another one is when he auditions for Jeff Goldblum. He inadvertently figures out that the only way he can get the intensity he needs for the scene is to not go to the bathroom for several hours beforehand. It's funny in and of itself, but what really makes the scene is when he gets so flustered he starts reading the stage directions in his script aloud... as in, "Oh, I want to, Long Pause!" We still say that around my house. (We also have been known to mimic his inept Italian accent: "That's-a what I suspected-a-da-da!")
8. Early in the series, Ross takes Rachel on a romantic after-hours date to the natural history museum where he works. More specifically, to the museum's planetarium. He has it all: a picnic lunch to eat under the stars, a blanket to lie on... but he forgets to turn down the volume of the planetarium show's narration as it starts, so it suddenly blares in a tranquil moment: "BILLIONS OF YEARS AGO--" before he can hit the switch.
9. Okay, just one more Joey Acting Moment: Our hapless Friend gives himself a hernia lifting weights, and has to live through a day of shooting a medical drama before he can get his health insurance activated. This actually ends up working in his favor, because he has to play a terminally ill patient saying goodbye to his son. Sweating with pain, he asks the director, "Is it all right if I scream right up until the moment you say 'Action'?" For some reason, the director approves, and we get to hear Joey groan "Aaagghghhahaaatake good care of your momma, son."
10. The last moment I chose is actually a whole episode, which is the one where Monica and Chandler's relationship is finally uncovered by the other characters (appropriately titled "The One Where Everyone Finds Out"). They've been trying to keep it secret that they've seen sleeping together since their London trip, but haven't done a very good job of it. Joey finds out, and almost immediately reveals the information to Rachel and Phoebe... and just as quickly leaks the fact that he accidentally told back to Chandler and Monica. This leads to classic sit-com lines like "They don't know that we know they know!" and a game of sexual chicken as Phoebe pretends to seduce Chandler, knowing that he can't go through with it without spilling that he's in a relationship with Monica. It's convoluted, well-written, and brilliantly acted. I can't think of a more perfectly crafted sitcom episode, from any series.
Let's face it, there just will never be a time again when television will be as communal as it was in the 90s, and thus no show that's as universally remembered that comes after Friends. And now, I'll spend the next week coming up with other moments I'll wish I had included in this list. But I'll leave you with a final word:
Meshuggahnuts!
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