Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox Arquette, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Matthew Perry and David Schwimmer star in this hit comedy about six close-knit young friends living in New York City.

Beginning its ninth season as the leadoff series on NBC’s enormously popular “Must See TV” Thursday-night lineup, “Friends” continues to garner critical acclaim and ratings success. The show reigns as the number-one show on television.

Since its debut season (1994-95), “Friends” has received 44 Emmy Award nominations, including five 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, 2002) for a Golden Globe Award for Best Television Series, Musical or Comedy. “Friends” won the People’s Choice Award for Favorite New Comedy Series in its first season, and has since won three more times as Favorite Comedy Series.

The series focuses on the friendship of three men and three women who frequently gather at each other’s apartments and share sofa space at Greenwich Village’s “Central Perk” coffeehouse. Monica (Cox Arquette) is a chef with an obsession for neatness and order in her life. She is also married to Chandler (Perry), a dry wit who is never at a loss for words. Across the hall is Chandler’s longtime roommate Joey (LeBlanc), a womanizing actor currently on the soap opera “Days of Our Lives.”

Across the alley from Monica and Chandler is Monica’s hapless brother Ross (Schwimmer), a paleontology professor who has been divorced three times, including once from Rachel (Aniston), Monica’s best friend from high school. Although Rachel is no longer romantically involved with Ross, she currently shares his apartment where they are raising their newborn daughter, Emma. Rounding out the circle of friends is Monica’s ex-roommate, Phoebe Buffay (Kudrow), an offbeat, eternally optimistic folk singer and massage therapist.

The series was created by the writing team of Marta Kauffman & 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.

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Ross Geller (David Schwimmer): Ross is Monica's brother. He has a Ph.D. in paleontology. Originally in the series, he worked for a museum [102]. He lost that job in season 5, due to his "rage problem." Later he became a guest lecturer at NYU (episode [604]). This lead to a full-time teaching position there.

Ross's wife divorced him after she realised/decided that she was a lesbian [101]. Much of season one involved her pregnancy (discovered in episode 102). She finally gave birth to Ross' son Ben [123] and both she and her partner want Ross to be involved with the child to some degree [102] despite the fact that he doesn't really get along with his ex-wife's wife. But that may be changing. He not only gave away the bride at her wedding but he even danced with her new wife. [211] Ross speaks very precisely [103] and is somewhat shy. He had a pet monkey named Marcel [110] who he had to send to zoo when it hit puberty [121].

Ross has been madly in love with Rachel since the ninth grade. At the end of the first season, he gave up on Rachel and began seeing Julie, whom he knew in Grad School and re-met on a trip to China [201]. When he found out that Rachel was interested in him, he broke up with Julie but blew it with Rachel when "the list" he made to help him decide between Julie and Rachel fell into Rachel's hands. [208] But they got over their differences and became a couple [214]. However, they broke up because their relationship was stressed by Rachel's busy schedule and Ross's jealousy [312][315]. The next morning Rachel changed her mind and a reconciliation looked likely, until she found out that Ross has slept with Chloe, the navel-ringed copy store girl [316]. Rachel couldn't forgive Ross but he claimed innocence since they were on a break. Because of their strong feelings, they briefly got back together at the beach [325] but it wasn't long before they right back to the same arguement (We were on a break!) [401].

In season 4, Ross met Emily Waltham [414], a woman visiting from London, and after a very hasty courtship, they decided to get married [419]. However, at the wedding in London, Ross accidently spoke Rachel's name instead of Emily's [423][424]. Although they still went through with the wedding, their relationship quickly disintigrated. Emily decided she can never trust Ross, so they got divorced.

Ross and Rachel's friendship began improving again, and in the final episode of the fifth season, they got drunk in Las Vegas and ended up getting married [524]. Early in the sixth season that was corrected with a divorce. Another notable occurance was when Rachel and Ross arranged to be their "backups" if they weren't married by the time they're 40 [625].
In early season 8, we learned that Ross fathered Rachel's child during a "one-night stand." Both have internal conflicts about where they want or think the relationship should go, but neither one seems to admit that they still want to be together. At the end of season 8, after the baby is born, Ross is apparently ready to propose to Rachel. However, a strange turn of events has led Rachel to agree to marry Joey, even though he didn't really ask (nor did he intend to).

By now (start of the 9th season) Ross is 34, based on his statement eight years ago in the pilot episode, "I'm only 26 and I'm divorced!", and his statement four years ago in episode [509], "I am 30 years old, and I'm about to be divorced twice." In episode [902] his birthday is stated as October 18th. That is consistent with episode [205], which aired in October 1995, had him celebrating his birthday at the hootie concert. But I don't blame Joey for thinking Ross' birthday was in Maytember, because I'm not sure anyone really could keep track of it. Episode [104], which aired in October 1994, had Ross state his birthday was "7 months ago," which would seem to place it in March. And Ross told Gunther his birthday was in December, in episode [405]. Maybe Ross just likes getting presents all year round?

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Monica E. Geller (Courteney Cox): Monica is Ross' sister. She was a cook at a trendy restaurant, Iridium, on 65th and Broadway [101] until she was fired for accepting a kickback, which was against restaurant policy [205]. She's had a few different chef positions througout the rest of the series. She rents the apartment where much of the show's action takes place. Considering her former job, it is quite an amazing apartment. JG suggested that it might be an illegal sublet (see question 2.06), and this was confirmed in "TOW the Ballroom Dancing" [404]. She cannot seem to get her mother to approve of her at all [102][108]. The others consider her to be very bossy, anal-retentive, and controlling.

Monica has dated a number of men in the show, usually with bad luck. If she likes them, they turn out to be schleps [101]. If she doesn't like him, her friends love him [103]. And, just once, he turned out to be way too young [122]. And sometimes too old. She dated her father's friend Richard Burke (played by Tom Seleck) who is much older than she is [215] but they broke up [224]. Then she dated Pete Becker, a millionaire in the computer software industry [318]. Eventually, things were going very well for them (he even bought her a restaurant [321]). However, she broke it off when she discovered he's an obsessively stubborn person who doesn't know when to quit [324]. After she left Pete she had a brief catering business with Phoebe [406], but then got the position of head chef at another restaurant (which she had given a bad review, so all the staff hate her) [409]. She briefly dated Richard Burke's son [408], but it was too weird. Recently, she and Chandler ended up in bed together, after spending most of Ross' rehearsal dinner consoling each other [424]. That these two would get together has been desired by fans and hinted by various sub-plots. I.E. [325],[401].

Monica and Chandler continued their romance and tried to keep it a secret. But eventually everyone found out [514]. While in Las Vegas, they decide to get married. While waiting their turn at the chapel, they discovered Ross and Rachel (who were very drunk) have just been married [524]. That derailed everything (they weren't ready anyway) but they decided to move in with each other early in the sixth season. At the end of season 6, Chandler finally proposed again (although it almost didn't happen)[624]. They were married at the end of season 7. Their wedding date is May 15th, 2001 even though the marriage episode aired on May 17th. This is known from a statement Monica made in episode [717].

Monica is approximately 33 at the start of season 9. This is based upon her statement that she was 28 during season 3, and that she was "25 and 13 months" (26 for those who are slow) in "TOW The Ick Factor" [122] (near the end of season 1).

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Chandler Muriel Bing (Matthew Perry): Chandler was a data processor who didn't care for his job. However, in the middle of the first season he recevied a promotion [115] to be manager over other data processors. His job is officially, "Statistical analysis and data reconfiguration." Some of this co-workers thought he was gay, as did some women in college [108]. So did Mr. Heckles, the former neighbor who lived (and died) downstairs [203]. Chandler has a very hard time asking women out [106] as well as breaking up with them, I.E. the horrid Janice [105]. He seems to get stuck with Janice repeatedly [110][114][224-308][415]. Chandler enjoyed a long (by his standards) and promising relationship with Kathy, who was originally Joey's girlfriend but was a much better match for Chandler. Unfortunately, it didn't last [405-413]. Recently, he and Monica ended up in bed together, after spending most of Ross' rehearsal dinner consoling each other [424]. That these two would get together has been desired by fans and hinted by various sub-plots. I.E. [325],[401].

Monica and Chandler continued their romance and tried to keep it a secret. But eventually everyone found out [514]. While in Las Vegas, they decide to get married. While waiting their turn at the chapel, they discovered Ross and Rachel (who were very drunk) have just been married [524]. That derailed everything (they weren't ready anyway) but they decided to move in with each other early in the sixth season. At the end of season 6, Chandler finally proposed again (although it almost didn't happen)[624][624]. They were married at the end of season 7. Their wedding date is May 15th, 2001 even though the marriage episode aired on May 17th. This is known from a statement Monica made in episode [717].
Chandler's mother writes romance novels and embarasses Chandler greatly [111]. He used to smoke and sometimes still has trouble [103][317][318]. He lived with Joey across the hall from Monica and Rachel, until he moved in with Monica is season 6.

Chandler's age, as of season 9, is 34. This is based on the fact that in episode 407 (5 years earlier) he mentioned he was 29, in episode [407]: "I'm 29. Who needs a savings account?"

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Joey Francis Tribbiani (Matt LeBlanc): At first, Joey lived with Chandler across from Rachel and Monica. He still lives there, but his roommate has changed frequently. He is an aspiring actor who continually gets rather pathetic roles. These include Pinocchio in a children's production [101] as well as Sigmund Freud in a musical of Freud's life [106]. He was also the poster boy for VD [109]. His almost-breakthrough role (which he messed up) was as Al Pacino's butt-double in a movie [106]. He finally got a break and appeared on Days of our Lives as a doctor [210], until the writers killed him off [218]. He had a part in a movie with Charles Heston [414]. Near the end of season 5, he got the lead in a movie called Shutter Speed [522]. However, when he got on location in Las Vegas for filming, he found the film had been closed down due to lack of funds. So he got a job a Caesar's Palace. Joey's presence in Vegas is what leads to everyone else coming to Vegas for a weekend, which was were the final episodes of season 5 took place[523][524].

Joey is kinda slow intellectually. He is quite active with the females, but never has a lasting relationship.
During season 8 Joey developed feelings for Rachel, but help them back because he didn't want to interfere with chances of Rachel and Ross getting together. Once Ross told him to go ahead and tell Rachel, he did... but found out Rachel didn't feel the same way. At the end of season 8, a strange turn of events led Rachel to believe Joey was proposing marriage to her... and she accepted.

Sometime during the 9th season, Joey should turn 35, since he was 28 as of "The One Where Joey Moves Out", a 2nd season episode). This is confirmed in episode [619] when (during a discussion of Spring Break) it was mentioned that he was 13 in spring of 1981. That makes him 34 in spring of 2002, and on schedule to turn 35 during season 9. However, there are inconsistencies. In episode 701 it's mentioned that he's 31 (which would make him 33 at the beginning of season 9). That seemed to be confirmed the next year in episode [802], where Chandler reminds Joey that he is 32. So which episodes do you believe? (Hint: None of this is real, so you don't have to believe any of them if you don't want to.)

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Rachel Karen Green (Jennifer Aniston): Rachel was very much a suburbs woman, who, until the start of the series, had never held a job and had always lived off daddy's money [101]. At the start of the show she had just left Barry, her husband-to-be, at the altar and ran to (and moved in with) the only friend she could think of (at least the only friends who wasn't invited to the wedding): Monica [101]. It took her a while to get into the groove of living and working in the big city. She worked as a waitress until mid-third season, when she quit [310], then got a job at Bloomingdale's [311]. She now works at Ralph Lauren [517][518] as the Coordinator of the Women's Collection.

Rachel has dated many guys (much to Ross' chagrin), most notably Paolo, an Italian man who could barely speak English [107-112], and much later, Joshua, a well-to-do young customer at Bloomingdales [413-420]. For all of the first season, she was oblivious to Ross' crush on her. At the end of the season Chandler let it slip and she decided to go for it. However, by that time Ross had found a new girlfriend (Julie). When she got drunk and told Ross that she was over him, he decided to leave Julie. However, a list [208] of pros and cons about Rachel (which Ross was using as part of his decision between her and Julie) upset her and she turned away (but, of course, later forgave him and they got together). However, they broke up because their relationship was stressed by Rachel's busy schedule and Ross's jealousy [312][315]. The next morning Rachel changed her mind and a reconciliation looked likely, until she found out that Ross had slept with Chloe, the navel-ringed copy store girl [316]. Rachel couldn't forgive Ross, but he claimed innocence since they were on a break. Because of their strong feelings, they briefly got back together at the beach [325] but it wasn't long before they broke up (still arguing about the alleged "break" they were on [401]. In season 4, Ross met Emily Waltham [414], a woman visiting from London, and after a very hasty courtship, they decided to get married [419].

However, at the wedding in London, Ross accidently speaks Rachel's name instead of Emily's [423][424]. While they still went through with the wedding, this event planted the seed which eventually led to their divorce.
Ross and Rachel's friendship began improving again, and in the final episode of the fifth season, they got drunk in Las Vegas and ended up getting married [524]. Early in the sixth season that was corrected with a divorced. Another notable occurance was when Rachel and Ross arranged to be their "backups" if they weren't married by the time they're 40 [625].

At the end of season 7, we learn Rachel is pregnant. In early season 8, we learned that Ross is the father. Both have internal conflicts about where they want or think the relationship should go, but neither one seems to admit that they still want to be together. At the end of season 8, after the baby is born, Ross is apparently ready to propose to Rachel. However, a strange turn of events has led Rachel to agree to marry Joey, even though he didn't really ask (nor did he intend to).

Rachel's parents have problems of their own as well. Her mother (having married her own "Barry") envied Rachel's free life, and for that and several other better reasons has divorced her husband [211][222].
Rachel's age is a bit... um... flexible? She should be about 33 by the end of the 8th season, even though the writers claim she only turned 30 in episode [714]. My figure of 33 is based on several things:

We know her birthday is on May 5th, because Gunther asked her in episode [405]. This is further confirmed by the fact that she has had several birthday parties near the end of several seasons [124] [222] (and seasons usually end around May). Rachel stated that she is 28 in episode [416] and therefore would have turned 29 at the end of that same season.

I suppose you could argue that she was rounding up to the nearest full year. But, hey, women don't do that.... especially women like Rachel. Maybe you could say season 4 was a bit out of sequence, and ep 416 was after her birthday (breaking with the precident of seasons 1 and 2). After all, in seasosn 7 and 9 she had her birthday parties in mid season, instead of the end of the season. But even if we adjust the calculations down by a year to account for this, there's still an additional year discrepancy. One other inconsistency in her birthday information is that in episode [722], the cop looking at her driver's license commentented that she is an Aquarius, but that would put her birthday in January or February. Rachel, if born May 5th, would be a Taurus. Maybe the writers or Jennifer Aniston thought that having Rachel be a bull was not consistent with her character.
In season 9, Rachel's birthday was celebrated during the January 16, 2003 episode 912. This isn't very consistent with May 5th, but it is definately consistent with being an Aquarius.

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Phoebe Buffay (Lisa Kudrow): Phoebe is way out in left field most of the time. Often the cause of strange looks and shrugs from the others, Phoebe left home early in life after her mother committed suicide; she moved to the city where her albino male roommate committed suicide; she got her act together when she discovered aroma-therapy [101]. She is a masseuse [112] and also sings at Central Perk, often about death. She is very spiritual (not necessarily in a religious sense). She cleanses auras [101] and believes she can sometimes read thoughts of people or sense the presence of departed friends or family. She once was inhabited by the spirit of an old lady who died on her massage table [211]. She had a friend whom she believes was reincarnated as a pencil [108]. She lived with her grandmother [104] for much of the show, but her Grandmother died [513]. Presumably Phoebe still lives in the apartment she shared with her.

Her sister, Ursula Pamela Buffay, is a waitress at Riff's, a restaurant featured in 'Mad About You' [102], but they do not get along [116-117].
Many plots that focus on Phoebe involve her complicated family relationships. In addition to Ursula, we have had episodes that centered around her husband [204], her search for her father [209], her brother (Frank, Jr.) [305], Frank Jr.'s wife and home-ec teacher (Alice) [318], her discovery of her birth mother [325][401], and the surrogate pregnancy she went through for Frank, Jr. and Alice [411]-[503], and finally meeting her father at her grandmother's memorial service [513].

I don't have much info to confirm her age, but we know she's over 32 by the end of season 8. In TOW They All Turn Thirty, [714], there's a flashback (how long back, we don't know) to Phoebe's "30th birthday," where Ursula shows her a birth certificate proving she's really 31 at that time. We do know Phoebe's birthday, even if we don't know the year. It's February 16th, which she tells Frank Jr. in episode [305]. However, in episode [905] her birthday is celebrated (with a nice dinner out) on Halloween. She admits she couldn't get reservations on the actual night of her birthday, so she got them on Halloween instead. Either the restaurant was booked up for 8 months, or the writers forgot when her birthday is.

By the way, Frank Jr's birthday is October 25th.
According to Phoebe, she will die on October 25th, 2032 (revealed in episode [703]).

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