David Crane and Marta Kauffman, the showrunners of the 1990s sitcom Friendshave revealed that NBC forced them to rethink one of Monica Geller’s decisions during the pilot episode. Monica is one of six iconic characters who have spent nearly a decade sharing their lives with viewers around the world, from dating and career changes to falling in love and becoming parents, all while dealing with every crisis the writers could think of.

But during the pilot episode “The One Where Monica Gets a Roommate” Monica does something that catches the attention of NBC executives. Something that the live audience ultimately had a say in whether it would be included in the final version. In the episode, Monica sleeps with a guy on their first date. She calls him “Paul the wine guy” and decides to sleep with him after he tells her he hasn’t had sex in two years. The problem is that Paul lied to her and told her this to get her to have sex out of pity.

Friends

Release date

22 September 1994

According to The Hollywood Reporter, executives at NBC weren’t happy with this part of the script. Crane says, “The guy in charge said, ‘We’re not going to like Monica because (in the pilot) she sleeps with a guy on the first date.’ We argued that this makes her likable.” He then mentions that a disgusting questionnaire was handed out to the live audience:

“To prove that the audience wouldn’t like Monica if she slept with a guy on the first date, the broadcaster distributed a short questionnaire to the audience at our dress rehearsal.
And it was so distorted. The question was like, “If Monica sleeps with a guy on her first date, is she a) a slut or b) a whore?”
‘”

The answers on the ballots surprised the leaders, who hopefully realized they were wrong, and the public saw that it was not such a big deal: “People wrote, ‘No, it’s OK.'” And none of the possible answers were ticked. This was most likely reason enough to give the showrunners complete creative freedom in exploring what must have felt like “open-ended” storylines throughout the show.

The cultural progress of television from “I Love Lucy” to “Friends”

The cultural impact of the show speaks for itself. The audience applause was consistent until the end and that had everything to do with the lighthearted spirit of the storylines and the constant emotional manipulation with romantic “will they or won’t they” arcs. It’s a very boring show, but at the same time, the television landscape was quite different 30 years ago. For fan-favorite character Monica to be pilloried for something like sleeping on the first date is an insult to us today, but that’s how progress evolves. Remember, executives didn’t put Lucille Ball or anyone else in I love Lucy from even mentioning the word “pregnant” even though she is married to her on-screen husband. Things take time.

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Thankfully, the showrunners didn’t play by the rules and decided to include anything that served the story, from openly gay characters and their marriage to something as simple as casual sex. Yes, some jokes haven’t aged well, but looking back, it presented themes of adult life that should have always been “normal” without having to fear the wrath of network executives afraid of some characters’ autonomous choices.