One of the longest running and most successful American exports over the last twenty five years this show shot to fame the six main stars which saw them earning a reported £1 million dollars an episode each for the final few series. It has now ended and the main stars gone on to other things but there are always rumours of a reunion or movie spin off to follow.

Set in New York the comedy show focuses on the lives of six young people who frequent a coffee bar, siblings Monica and Ross (Courtney Cox and David Schwimmer), Ross high school friend Chandler (Matthew Perry) and his roommate Joey (Matt Leblanc) whilst the other two girls are Monica friend Rachael (Jennifer Aniston) and Pheobe (Lisa Kudrow).

The comedy is based on the interaction of each character and the witty one liners they all contribut, Chandler is the wise cracking sarcastic member whilst Pheobe is the oddball one. Joey has a boyish rather stupid charm about him whilst both Ross and Monica are quite uptight. Needless to say as it is an American sitcom they are all very attractive and even my limited knowledge of New York knows that they live in apartments way above the standard of living you would expect from the jobs they do, or in the case of Joey lack of jobs as for the early series he is constantly out of work as he is an actor.

Despite the holes in the plot this works well, the love interest is provided initially by Ross infatuation with Rachael and a lot of the early attraction for this show is based around the will they won't they debate.

Later series started to lose their edge however they did provide some variety with a long list of guest appearences most notably with the one featuring Aniston then husband Brad Pitt as a friend of Ross who hated her from their school days, needless to say there is a certain irony given their subsequent failed marriage.

A funny show well worth watching as it is repeated endlessly on E4 and to a lesser degree C4.