A Tribute to Friends (1994--2004) A Hollywood Jesus Commentary by Chris Utley. My wife had friends like these during her 4 years of study at Biola University. Friends, like Seinfeld, was an entertaining sitcom ride through the problems, perils, fun and fantasies of 6 everyday friends. It was always entertaining though. An Analysis of Friends (1. An entire generation grew up watching the hit TV show Friends, aside from its attractive and hilarious cast, the show had many ground- breaking aspects that drew in viewers. The writing of the show stayed fresh and fun, because of constant re- writes of jokes and use of attention- grabbing dialogue. The extreme attention to detail in all aspects of production including camera work, set decoration, lighting, and sound contributed to the high quality of the sitcom. The TV show’s creators, Marta Kauffman and David Crane had the number one network sitcom for years. Consistently, reruns have also had high ratings. With thirty- one million viewers tuning in on September 1. Americans (Chidester, 2. In his article written for the Critical Studies in Media Communication, about the “whiteness” of the TV show Friends, Phil Chidester states, “During its first four years of production, the sitcom received some twenty- seven Emmy and three Golden Globe nominations, a Screen Actors Guild Award in 1. A Friends special entitled “The One that Goes Behind the Scenes” was produced in 1. Friends (TV series 1994-2004) Aka: Across the Hall (USA: working title) Friends Like These (USA: working title) Director: Gary Halvorson, Kevin Bright, Michael Lembeck. Both Friends (NBC, 1994–2004) and Frasier. Like so many of the situation comedies from. These citations are generated programmatically and may not match every. This is a music video of the friends theme song 'I'll be there for. Friends TV Show Intros All Seasons 1994-2004. An Analysis of Friends (1994-2004). These friendships, which.This forty- two minute long segment goes behind the scenes of the show and analyses the first episode of season six: “The One After Vegas.” At that time, Friends had an average of twenty four million viewers every week. This segment gave an extensive look at what the crew went through to put the pieces of the show together after the summer hiatus (Enright, Alexander, 1. Marta Kauffman and David Crane explained how they met in college and wrote musicals together, but they weren’t making any money at it. So, they began writing TV scripts together and created the show Dream On which did well on HBO and ran for six seasons from 1. This success on cable opened the door to the networks, and together with their partner, Kevin S. Bright, Friends was up and running by 1. Bright, who directed many of the episodes of Friends believes there are two necessities for working in half hour comedy which are speed and good shoes (Enright, Alexander, 1. The art department used pictures taken of the sets from previous seasons to help redress the sets, making sure everything was in its proper place. However, the art department had an added challenge, because they couldn’t know exactly what the set would look like until the script was finalized which was often not until the last minute. The sets had to be reassembled and dressed, and all of the pieces of the standing sets had to be put back together. This task included the props which are anything an actor touches. Majorie Coster- Praytor, the shows’ Property Master, explained the importance of props on the show citing how there were six of Phoebe’s Doll Houses made since it caught on fire during the episode it was used in (Enright, Alexander, 1. The Gaffers have the job of making sure that each part of the scene is uniformly lit. Since sitcoms are shot using multiple cameras; Friends typically used four cameras and sometimes even five, the uniform lighting was an important aspect. Numbered tape marks were placed on the floors of the set to show which camera went where for camera blocking (Enright, Alexander, 1. During the production meetings props, costumes, and make- up were discussed as the crew went through the script. When rehearsals with the actors began for an episode, the script was tightened further. The script supervisor also timed the show with a stop watch to tell the writers how much more trimming needed to be made to the script during rehearsals. The writers were also present to watch the performance of the actors and decide which of the lines read funny or fell flat. Adam Chase, an executive producer of Friends believes that television is a writer’s medium, and that writers must be smart, funny and willing to work crazy hours. It typically took the cast and crew about five hours to shoot one episode of Friends. Set changes would take as long as twenty minutes, so a comedian entertained the live audience in between takes. Also re- writing was constantly being done between takes to determine whether or not a joke worked, and sometimes the live audience was even asked for input. Filming in front of a live audience was much like live theater and the actors often play off of the audience members’ energy (Enright, Alexander, 1. The final cut of the episode “The One After Vegas,” included fifty- two takes of fourteen scenes, which amounted to thirty thousand feet of film and twelve hours of footage to be edited. At times, the editor had to bring down the audience’s laugh and put in shorter laughter so it didn’t cover up the actor’s next line. After three days of editing, the show’s producers looked at a rough cut and took notes. Then, Bright worked with the editor to make changes to trim the show down to the exact length of twenty two minutes (Enright, Alexander, 1. The audio for Friends was re- dubbed on a Foley stage to recreate sound effects. The Foley artists, Mike and Casey Crabtree, got into character and became another person while using various objects to make sounds. The Music Editor of the show, Merelyn Davis decided where to put music in an episode. Each show wasn’t scored, but a bulk of music was received each season to use. Davis picked the music that fit the mood and situation for the episode’s twenty cues, which were each three seconds long. Finally, once all the different sound elements had come together, the proper volume levels were set and any hiss or frequency was edited out of the final mix (Enright, Alexander, 1. Marta Kauffman, along with her other producers and cast were leery of calling Friends a “Generation X” show, meaning that it was made for viewers born after the Baby Boomer generation. Kauffman, who is a Baby Boomer herself, believes that what the characters are experiencing on the show is universal. One of the main reasons that the show appealed to a large demographic age group is because the characters are easy to relate to. On the surface, they may seem like a stereotype, but they prove to be deeper than that. The characters care about each other, which makes the audience care about them. Friends was the first show to prove that a show about young people, for young people doesn’t have to be stupid (Owen, 1. The producers of the show try to have three storylines per episode going unlike most sitcoms which have two. Therefore, Friends has more scenes which are shorter in length while still maintaining interest by using the ensemble of actors to their fullest capacity. Kauffman and her producers stay away from teaching morals and lessons, and instead focus on realism for the show’s storylines. This is the reason that Friends is a serialized show and has continuing storylines (Owen, 1. Friends tells you what the show is about in its title name, and many sitcoms do now revolve around the lives of friends, but it wasn’t always that way. Sitcoms used to be about family, but during the last twenty years a shift has taken place. TV shows of today often focus on friend groupings who hang out at work, caf. The humor is based on wit and situational comedy coming from characters that have close relationships and see each other frequently (Brooks, 2. This change says something more meaningful about the differences of American friendships in today’s world. Young people are now spending a longer period living outside of a traditional family, often waiting until their thirties to marry and have children. This has caused young people to form friendship groups who often live together. These friendships, which are often deep and complicated, are the basis for great comedy. Sitcoms focused on friendships also appeal to a middle- aged audience who enjoy watching the characters participate in intimate connection with friends, which they have often had to sacrifice in their own lives. Comedy TV shows celebrate individual relationships within a complex group of people rather than just a one on one friendship. These friendships create differing types of social problems within the group because of their complicated nature (Brooks, 2. Friends helped change the face of television. A series with six twenty- something’s as the main characters, intensified an already growing interest in attracting a younger demographic. Advertisers saw Friends as the embodiment of a wrinkle- free series that could transfix viewers ages eighteen to forty- nine (Berman, 2. Since Friends was so successful, every network looked for its own imitation. These “clones” included The Single Guy, Central Park West, Dweebs, Caroline and the City, First Time Out, Simon, Union Square, Jesse, The Crew, Partners, Too Something, New York Daze, The Last Frontier, Inside Schwartz, Townies, Guys Like Us, and Can't Hurry Love. Out of all of them, the only show that didn’t flop was Caroline in the City, mostly due to its time slot (Owen, 1. Berman, 2. 00. 4). Young adults became a more important demographic than ever before, regardless of all the unsuccessful Friends TV show clones. The achievements of the “golden six” still notified advertisers they should pursue the young adult audience no matter what. While it is a memorable fact that hair stylists in America tribute the sitcom with altering the hairstyles of women, the TV show Friends was influential in changing the way television is sold to advertisers (Berman, 2. Another aspect of Friends, that made the sitcom innovative, was the linguistics of the show. Sali Tagliamonte and Chris Roberts used eight seasons worth of scripts to analyze the character’s dialogue. According to them, the viewers had “absorbed Friendspeak like a sponge.” Rachel, Ross, Monica, Chandler, Joey and Phoebe were young middle- class characters living in New York City, who pushed the borders of the United States’ lingo. The language of the show could have taken credit for the show’s popularity since young viewers wanted to be funky and cool just like the characters.
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