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 is a chef with an obsession for neatness and order in her life. She is also married to Chandler, a dry wit who is never at a loss for words. Across the hall is Chandler’s long-time roommate Joey, 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 , a palaeontology professor who has been divorced three times, including once from Rachel, 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.