Friends Thru A Lens: The Holidays with Ella Risbridger

Summary

Sentimental Garbage – Friends Thru A Lens: The Holidays with Ella Risbridger

Podcast: Sentimental Garbage
Host: Caroline O’Donoghue
Guest: Ella Risbridger
Date: December 19, 2025

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Episode Overview

In this heartfelt and festive episode of Sentimental Garbage, host Caroline O’Donoghue is joined by long-time best friend and writer Ella Risbridger to reflect on the holiday episodes of Friends — particularly how the sitcom explores loneliness, found family, holiday traditions, and personal growth. Set amidst their own major life changes and a move to Dublin for Caroline, the discussion weaves together deep insights, literary references, and plenty of laughs, offering comfort and nostalgia for listeners as the podcast heads into a hiatus.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Recording and Real-Life Context

• Caroline reveals she’s recording from a nearly empty apartment in Dublin, living alone for the first time, while Ella is in London with her newly-acquired fat Christmas tree.
  • “I’m understanding not just the artistic need for friends in a person’s life, but the social need for friends in a person’s life.” — Caroline (02:00)
• They share that this is their second attempt at a Christmas special, the first having floundered due to stress and illness.
  • “It’s important when you do any kind of performing or entertaining for a living to just know when you’re not entertaining anyone. We weren’t entertaining ourselves and we certainly weren’t entertaining the listeners.” — Ella (06:40)

2. The Holidays as a Lens on Friends

• Ella pitches Christmas and the holidays as their “lens”, highlighting how Friends often uses holiday episodes to show the characters’ changing relationships.
• They note Friends as a reference point — how time spent apart recalls Chandler being in Tulsa for work, paralleling their own lives this year.
  • “Sometimes Chandler has to go to Tulsa and Caroline has to go to Dublin. And let me tell you, I am as bereft as Monica.” — Ella (02:28)

3. How Friends Functions as Comfort and Archetype

• Caroline explains that watching and dissecting Friends with close friends brought up deeper conversations about real-life relationships.
  • “Talking about Friends to Millennials is almost like talking about the stations of the cross or very important biblical stories that everybody knows.” — Caroline (08:44)
• Both agree on the importance of fiction as a way to “practice” and process feelings about the world and relationships.

4. The Character Arc of Chandler Bing

• Ella claims Chandler is the true holiday character: hated Thanksgiving and milestones as a child, but his arc is about learning to love holidays, family, and change.
  • “Chandler goes from being the boy who hates Thanksgiving because he has no family to the man with his children and his wife and his friends moving out to live a life of domestic bliss.” — Ella (12:32)
• The infamous Thanksgiving trauma — Chandler’s parents’ divorce revealed during the holiday (with surreal, almost Lynchian flashbacks), and how it shapes his evolving relationship to the holidays.
• Chandler's refusal to repeat his parents’ mistakes — choosing not to have an affair and quitting a job he hates to spend time with his chosen family.
  • “You have been two feet into this, like, job that you hate… You’ve broken the cycle, and now you’re like: I love Christmas, I love my family, I’m going to get a new job that I like. It’s literally ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’.” — Caroline (29:29)

5. Monica’s Holiday Arc: Perfectionism and Letting Go

• Monica’s journey from anxious hostess to someone who ultimately lets go of perfection in a moment of chaos after learning she’ll become a mother.
  • “Everything is ruined, and Monica doesn’t care. That’s her arc, is to look at the chaos and just be delighted that her friends are there with her for this moment that will change her life forever.” — Ella (77:15)
• The cyclical, evolving nature of group traditions as friends age and life changes; not every tradition must be upheld every year.

6. Phoebe as the Spirit of Christmas

• Phoebe is described as embodying the spirit of Christmas: open-hearted, generous, and a finder of magic in everyday moments, unlike Chandler, who is transformed by Christmas.
  • “Phoebe is Christmas with all the bittersweetness that implies… Phoebe’s real thing, right, is she’s always trying so hard.” — Ella (39:00)

7. Faith, Family, and Found Family in Friends

• Discussion of the Jewish identity of several core characters, how it’s mostly represented through their parents, and the significance of episodes like “The One with the Holiday Armadillo” (directed by David Schwimmer).
  • “The show rarely feels like it is Jewish unless the older people are involved… except for the Holiday Armadillo episode, which is directed by Schwimmer.” — Caroline (56:09)
• The blend of biological and “found” family, especially as the friends construct new holiday traditions in their 20s (and as listeners do in their own lives).

8. Rankings, Relationships, and Sex on Friends

• Hilarious and candid ranking of the characters’ “skills in bed,” with particular defense of Ross as “surprisingly good at sex.”
  • “Ross is good at sex. Everyone wants to have sex with him all the time. He has the most beautiful girlfriends in New York City.” — Caroline (64:03)
• Monica’s ease with her body and sexuality is identified as one of her few places of unalloyed joy.
  • “It’s the one part of [Monica’s] life where she’s always been able to experience joy… without complicated shit.” — Ella (70:10)

9. Television Narratives as a Framework for Processing Life

• Both discuss using TV season metaphors to process real-life transitions, losses, and reunions. The idea that people “rise and fall in the plot,” just as recurring secondary characters (Gunther, Janice, Estelle) do in Friends.
  • “Every person, they look back on their life and they see it in terms of: that was the tough time before the good time happened… we all think of our lives in terms of stories.” — Caroline (34:39)
• The importance of having narrative closure and the benefits of shows ending “gracefully” while friendships continue in other forms and chapters.

10. Decor, Nostalgia, and Sensory Memories

• Loving tribute to the (often terrible) decor in Friends’ apartments and how those details generate nostalgia.
  • “Friends has that same doll’s house quality as a Nora Ephron movie… particularly Monica’s apartment, that same doll’s house quality.” — Ella (58:49)

11. Sentimental Christmas Reflections

• Deep mutual gratitude for friendship and the festivities they’ve shared in real life, especially when separated from their families or going through hard times.
  • “We just became the unit that formed around him and around each other… when you say ‘found family’ about those kinds of people… it means she is my sister.” — Caroline (34:56)
• They conclude that the arc of Friends — like Christmas — is fundamentally about learning to love and be loved.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Talking about Friends to Millennials is almost like talking about the stations of the cross or… biblical stories that everybody knows.” — Caroline (08:44)
• “Chandler goes from being the boy who hates Thanksgiving because he has no family to the man with his children and his wife and his friends moving out to live a life of, like, domestic bliss.” — Ella (12:32)
• “Everything is ruined, and Monica doesn’t care… her arc is to look at the chaos and just be delighted.” — Ella (77:15)
• “Phoebe is Christmas with all the bittersweetness that implies.” — Ella (39:00)
• “I think that Monica and Ross don’t really need found family. Phoebe does, but she kind of finds it in Mike… Chandler gloms onto Ross and never lets go.” — Ella (14:32)
• “Of all the payoffs, [Chandler quitting his job to be present at Christmas] is one of the best… You didn’t know that Chandler was gonna love Christmas so much he’d leave his job to do it.” — Caroline (81:07)
• “I love my friends. I love my family. I’m very happy to be here in this weird Christmas where everything is changing. And I know that I could have said that anytime in the last 10 years. Because that’s life.” — Ella (83:19)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:38-02:28: Opening banter — life changes, holidays, recording context.
• 08:33-10:33: Friends as archetype for real-life relationships.
• 12:10-14:15: Chandler’s holiday arc.
• 25:34-27:34: Surrealism of Chandler’s childhood flashbacks.
• 29:29: Chandler’s transformation and leaving job for family.
• 31:48-33:03: Monica’s first attempts at hosting, sharing personal parallels.
• 39:00-40:19: Phoebe as embodiment of Christmas spirit.
• 45:17-46:26: Thanksgiving flashbacks and Monica’s chef career.
• 62:09-66:20: Sex and skill rankings among the Friends.
• 70:10: Monica’s relationship to sex and self-joy.
• 77:15-78:13: Monica’s final holiday arc — letting go of perfection.
• 80:16-82:07: “It’s a Wonderful Life” parallels and Chandler’s journey.
• 83:19: Personal reflections, friendship, and ending the year.

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Original Language and Tone

Caroline and Ella’s conversation moves fluidly between affection, deep analysis, humor, and emotional honesty. There is witty banter (e.g. “a chode Christmas tree”), sharp self-awareness, and meta-references to the act of making podcast content. Their warmth for each other and their audience — as well as their literary and pop culture fluency — shapes an atmosphere at once cozy, clever, and bittersweet.

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Closing Thoughts

This special not only honors Friends as comforting holiday TV, but provides deeper resonance about chosen family, change, and the challenge of building tradition amidst uncertainty. As Sentimental Garbage heads into hiatus, this episode feels like not just a reflection on Friends, but a loving message to listeners: it’s okay for traditions to change, and the messiness of life, family, and friendship is sometimes the most festive thing of all.

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“People learning to open up their poor, bruised little hearts and let people in. And happy Christmas to you all.”

— Ella Risbridger (82:07)

Transcript

[Ella Riz Bridger]

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[Caroline]

Hello and welcome to Friends Through a Lens, the podcast where I talk to my real life friends about the show Friends Through a Lens of their choosing. My name is Caroline and this year I'm spending Christmas in Tulsa and my favorite part was when Superman flew the Jews out of Egypt. It's Ella Riz Bridger.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Hi, best friend. There you are. There you are. In Tulsa.

[Caroline]

Here I am in Tulsa, which is an anagram for Dublin this year. I tell you what, dude, to let everybody behind the scenes on some movie magic of how I make this podcast. Almost every episode of the podcast that you've heard of Friends Through a Lens so far was recorded in October and November when I was preparing to leave to go live in Dublin to make the Rachel Incident the TV show for Channel four. Look it up. It's going to be great.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

It's going to be so good.

[Caroline]

And this episode we're recording from, I'm recording it from like a new build, completely empty apartment in Dublin. I'm living by myself for the first time ever. And like, I'm understanding not just the sort of like artistic need for friends in a person's life, but the social need for friends in a person's life. Because this is the first time I've ever lived alone and now I just have friends on all the time, so I don't feel. Feel lonely.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

It's a Friends is a friend. Friends is a friend to us all.

[Caroline]

Friends. Friends is a friend. Friends is a friend.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Friends is a friend. And that's what this is. The lens.

[Caroline]

The lens of friends is they are our friends.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

No, the lens of friends through which we will be looking at friends today is, I guess, Christmas and the holidays, which will be a nice lens because we were initially going to do the feasts of Friends, but I don't know, I couldn't quite be bothered. You know, the feasts are all at Christmas, apart from that one time they make the Lasagna and Monica's nail goes off in it. I don't know. I just very, very tired. I wanted to talk about, like, the twinkly bits and you know when they're all together or not all together. Because sometimes Chandler has to go to Tulsa and Caroline has to go to Dublin. And let me tell you, I am as bereft as Monica. We're all as bereft as Monica.

[Caroline]

It's really weird. Like. Like, to be absolutely clear, I'm having a wonderful time here in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Dublin, Ireland. And, like, I'm getting to do something that I've spent my whole life dreaming of doing, which is making a TV show and out of like, a book that I wrote, which is a huge privilege. But, like, the fact remains is that it is Christmas and I live in a new build with nothing on the walls and I have no tree and nothing. And the other day I went with some friends to go see A Muppet's Christmas Carol, which I do every year in the cinema if I can manage it. And I remember feeling in the cinema, I was like, huh, Kind of weird that we're watching this, right? Because it's a Christmas movie. It was like. Like it completely escaped me totally that it's Christmas this year because there's nothing in my life that indicates Christmas.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Oh, no. You're just like not being cued by the things around you. Whereas I feel like.

[Caroline]

Exactly. There are no cues. No cues.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I feel like I have really dragged Christmas kicking and screaming into my life. I don't do every year. I don't. I'm not a huge fan of December, but I am a huge fan of magic. I hate force fun, but I love twinkly lights. So, you know, I. I have to kind of balance that at Christmas. Whereas I feel bad because I'm sitting here with my Christmas tree. Which, by the way, new thing I've done this year, get a short fat Christmas tree instead of a tall thin one. New look. Radical new look for 2024.

[Caroline]

Radical new look. A chode Christmas tree.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I'm. I'm loving it. And you know what I'm loving most? I'm going to be able to put it in the bin at the end of Christmas. I'm going to be able to carry it to the place where it goes in the bin. It's going to be amazing. It's the first Christmas in my life. I'm not thinking about dragging it away.

[Caroline]

Every single year when it's time to get rid of that tree. It's like I have Amnesia. I'm like, how did we do this last year?

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Did.

[Caroline]

Did the council pick it up? Did. Did a man come? Did I pay somebody else? Did. Did they pay me? Is it recyclable? What happens?

[Ella Riz Bridger]

It's something of like, if you drag it to the park before a date, the council will turn into sort us. But I never drag it to the park before that day, and it just sits in my garden rotting. Anyway, the point is I'm dragging Christmas in kicking and screaming. And I think perhaps it's. It's funny and nice to. To tell the listeners that this is in fact our second go at recording the Christmas special. Because the first time we were both so unfestive and shit, then we just called it.

[Caroline]

Oh my God, it's so funny. So for people who don't realize if they're just new to the series, this year, every year for the last, I think, five or maybe six years, we have recorded a Christmas special of this podcast. It's something we look forward to. It's something a lot of the listeners look forward to. And they're great episodes. Go look them up. And this year we were like, oh, well, of course, it's the Friends miniseries, so we're gonna record the festive Friends or whatever. And then you came over to my house the day before I moved and. And we spent an hour trying to be anything that wasn't just like two incredibly stressed out women.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I had flu in their mid-30s ideal. I just kept sneezing and sort of just like, you know that stage of flu where you're like, crying softly a lot of the time and when people are like, what's wrong? You're like, nothing. I'm just weeping from my lost humanity. And so I had that. And you had moving to Dublin and having not packed, I. As we were recounting the plots of these Friends episodes to each other in this incredibly, like, both fake academic and totally joyless way. And of course, at Christmas, the Friends gather together and they are often joined by Jack Geller, the father of several of the other characters. Monica, and of course, her brother Ross. He has a child, of course, in.

[Caroline]

Other sense, Jack Geller is actually the father of all of the Friends in some senses, because of course, many of the Friends have. Have celebrated previous holidays together. It was awful. And eventually, after an hour of us trying to wring some charisma out of it, we were like, we gotta stop this. We gotta. We gotta stop.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I think it's important when you do any kind of performing or entertaining for a living, to just know when you. You. You're not entertaining anyone. We weren't entertaining ourselves and we certainly weren't entertaining the listeners. So listen, this is take two, and let me tell you, it's a lot more promising.

[Harry Harris (Oystercatcher)]

Free.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

For these reasons, we are on Zoom, which I wanted to avoid because we haven't recorded on Zoom since the deep days of the pandemic, when we did our best books we've ever read, which is such a funny idea for a miniseries. Just books we like, I guess.

[Caroline]

Yeah. No theme, just we like them.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

So the reason here, I will enunciate the reasons that this podcast is better than the last one. 1. I have some very nice champagne that my dad brought to our house, so. Excellent. I have a fancy little mince pie from the bakery near Caroline's house in London. And sorry to say, this car is really delicious. My Christmas tree is up and covered in velvet, and I've been quite. I've just posted 60 Christmas cards, some of them with airmail stickers on. And let me tell you, there is nothing more festive than sticking a little blue air mail sticker on a card. You know, cards. Winging their way across Europe to New York, I felt so continental and festive, and obviously it's not snowing, but in my heart it's snowing. And so those are the reasons that I feel 10 times more charismatic and 10 times more ready to take on friends, the TV series Friends, brackets, you and me, our long friendship, Christmas of Friends, Christmas in real life, and I guess whatever else comes up. Because of course, this is the last sentimental garbage for a long, long time.

[Caroline]

For a long, long time, boys and girls. Because, yeah, this is the. This is the other bit of news, really, because this is the last episode of the year. But I'm also. I'm going on a hiatus after this, really. I mean, the reason that I wanted to cap out sentimental garbage with incredibly long episodes about Friends is that I wanted to really feed people before I fasted them. You know what I mean?

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I think it's kind of lovely that you've made this last series of like, let me talk to all my friends about Friends, this TV show that everybody knows and loves. It feels like the perfect cause.

[Caroline]

You know what? It really is. And I'm so glad that you brought that up because the act of watching all these episodes and discussing them with people who I'm, like, really, really quite close with and people who I also know I'm not gonna see for a long time, because I'm gonna be coming back To London for weekends here and there. But for the most part, like I'm gonna be, you know, head down in a new life where it was almost like recording with Kate, recording with Dolly, recording with, with Ryan. Like, yes, we were talking about this TV show that everyone knows and loves, but it's almost like talking about Friends to Millennials is almost like talking about like, you know, the stations of the cross or like, like very important biblical stories that everybody knows. Everybody knows it so well. And all of these like archetypes of these pretend people are so recognizable. Whether you're talking about like, you know, like Monica and her relationship with her mother, or Ross's relationship with Phoebe, or Joey's relationship with Phoebe or whatever, there is such well worn ideas because everyone has seen it like 1 million times that like what I found with doing this series is that very soon I wasn't talking to Ryan about Phoebe or to dolly about fucking Mrs. Geller or whatever. I was talking to some of my best friends about how they feel about the deepest human relationships in their life and like how they feel at this point in their life where they are with their relationships. And I just feel like they offer this really interesting archetype of how we talk about our relationships in general. The last episode I did, I ended up like realizing some of the feelings I had about being in a family that I never would have realized if I weren't talking about it through the guardrails of Friends. Do you know what I mean? It's like a safe thing to hold on to while you navigate some kind of interesting psychological territory for yourself.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I think it's really interesting. It's something that I thought a lot about when I was writing in Love with Love. My most recent book, which is a history of romantic fiction that you can probably still buy as a very late Christmas presentation. There's probably somewhere doing next day delivery and you should. It's great. But about how fiction kind of allows us to practice how we feel about the world and it gives us a framework to think about how we think about things. And I was writing specifically about romantic fiction, but I do think that all art is supposed to be a way to reimagine and re establish your own relationship with your own life. And I think that's what Friends is for. You know, there's something about its ubiquity in the culture that makes it like a touchstone that you can come back to over and over again to be like, it's like that. But in Friends, it's like it really is Helping me to think of you having us Christmas in Tulsa. And that's ridiculous.

[Caroline]

It's really helping me.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

It really is, I guess, because this is the first Christmas where we've not spent substantial Christmas time together. Like making little ornaments of Sylph with her head in a cone or just, like, doing a little craft project or watching the Muppets. And it's like, oh, no. Sometimes Chandler got to go to Tulsa. And of course, Chandler comes back from Tulsa because Selma Blair makes a pass at him in a very sexy way that, you know, it shows real restraint that Chandler, a dork, does not plunge straight into an affair with Selma Blair. Blair. Well, you know what? How many women have hit on Chandler? Not that many. Ross is always punching above his weight. But Chandler, I don't think he's getting hit on that much. And so for Chandler to get hit on by Selma Blair and to be like, I love and respect my wife, that's a real sacrifice. Much more than it would be for Ross, who is always getting hit on by women out of his league.

[Caroline]

Always. Constantly. But, yeah, I've got some very strong theories on Ross sexuality which I believe to be strong and magnetic. But I kind of want to sit on Chandler for a while because he's also. This being the last episode of Friends, through a lens, he's kind of the friend we've spoken about the least. And I actually think Christmas belongs to Chandler in a way because I think one of the most satisfying arcs of the show is Christmas and Chandler.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

You know, so one thing that. So I'm actually amazed that nobody has talked that much about Chandler. I'm thrilled because I love to talk about Chandler. He's such a complex and rich scene for me. Because you must admit that although it's obviously Rachel's show Chandler is the other person who has a complete arc. Chandler goes from being the boy who hates Thanksgiving because he has no family to the man with his children and his wife and his friends moving out to live a life of, like, domestic bliss. And he's not gonna have an affair with the pool boy. He's not gonna repeat the patterns of his parents. It's about learning to be your own man.

[Caroline]

Oh, my God.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Of course.

[Caroline]

Because the whole thing with Chandler's whole story is he hates Thanksgiving. The Gellers hate him because he hates Thanksgiving. And because he got Ross high.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

He's raw than the boy who hates Thanksgiving.

[Caroline]

And they're like, yeah. And every year, it's all throughout the series, it's like, oh, and I guess Chandler is gonna Be like, eeyore about Thanksgiving again and say something snappy about thanks. And then when it gets to the point. And of course, like, that root trauma is in the fact that his father was having an affair and it was revealed to him on Thanksgiving. And then it's like Chandler is given the opportunity to have an affair on Thanksgiving and doesn't take it and comes home to his wife. And it's like, also. And it's a clip show episode. And it's like one of the only arguments for, like, oh, wow, it's an artistically substantive clip show episode. It's never happened anywhere else in culture before. But because the whole arc is about him leaving behind this childhood trauma of, like, you know, I hate Thanksgiving because of who I was age 0 to 20 and actually was like, oh, I love Thanksgiving because of who I became aged 20 to 35.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Crucially, who is around me. You know, there's obviously a lot of chat about friends as found family, but I think that Monica and Ross don't really need found family. Phoebe does, but she kind of finds it in Mike. She's always a little bit separate from the group. You know, she's always trying to prize Joey away to be just two of them.

[Caroline]

Yeah. But also she finds it. She finds it in Frank as well. And she gives it to Frank with the babies, you know.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yeah. And the person who needs that to belong to that family, like, Chandler gloms onto Ross and he never lets go.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Like, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's his college roommate. And then he's like, and I will marry your sister and I will be at every Christmas and every Thanksgiving for the rest of your life. Roscalla. Like, they like each other. Like, Ross is lucky that he likes Chandler because Chandler's like, oh, I see a normal family. Like, your mum's neurotic. Your dad's kind of like, bumbling. I want to be in there. You know, the Gellers have this new nuclear family which no one else in the show does. Ross. So many marriages, children by different women. Monica and Chandler actually do kind of replicate the nuclear family, even though they adopt. Like, they have a boy and a girl, which I think is very important for the show that Monica and Chandler end up with a replication of the Geller family legacy.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And, like, as does Ross as a.

[Caroline]

Boy and a girl.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yeah. But he's also got lesbian co parent wives. Ross has three wives. One of my favorite parts of this series is when you and Kate were having a really good time thinking about Ross and Rachel's wedding. And you know what? I love to think about Ross and Rachel's future life with Ben and Emma and the kids they have after that.

[Caroline]

You know, I always think about. With that. I always think about, you know, when Monica announces that she's moving to Westchester. And Rachel and she's like, I don't want to raise kids in the city. And Rachel goes, I'm doing it. Sarah Jessica Parker is doing it. And I'm like, yeah, Rachel, you're gonna raise kids in the city forever. You're gonna have, like, a snotty little teenager who goes to, like, insane private schools in New York that bankrupts you both. And she's gonna be friends with all of the kids in Gossip Girl.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

No, the Gellers will pay for that. The. The Gellers will pay for that.

[Caroline]

Oh, the. Sorry. Of course the Gellers will pay for that.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

The Gellers and the Greens will pay for that. Her dad. Her dad is so wealthy.

[Caroline]

So true.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

You think her dad, a girl dad of three girls who is a successful doctor in New York, will see his granddaughter go to a normal school? No. Come on.

[Caroline]

Oh, my God.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Dr. Green will step in.

[Caroline]

I found something about Dr. Green the other day that really made me very happy. And this is going to mean very little to you because you're not a Gilmore Girls fan, but the actor who you. Oh, right. I've gotten into it now. I feel like you've, like. You've sort of, like, walked up to it and run away from it a lot over the years. So I can never tell where you're at with the Gilmore Girls.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Listen, this is a diversion. Gilmore Girls for me, it's almost like it's just too much for me. Like, it's too, like, directly calibrated for me.

[Caroline]

That's how I feel about Fleabag.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I'm just a bit like. Yes, exactly like that. Whereas I could watch Fleabag because I'm like, oh, there's nothing. This is nothing like my life.

[Caroline]

I mean. I mean, my life isn't like fleabags either. I just know that it's for me in some way that it's not for you. Like, it was made for me in some way that wasn't made specifically for you. I don't know. I don't know exactly how to calibrate that, but it's just true.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

But Gilmore Girls was made for.

[Caroline]

Yes, was made for hobbyist brunette women who like crafts.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I mean, like, right now, I am loving being on this podcast, but every so often, I, like, glimpse down at, like, I'm sewing a stocking for my family Secret Santa. And I keep looking at my little embroidery where I'm going to embroider my Secret Santa's name and then I'm going to put all the presents in the stocking.

[Caroline]

Literally. Stars Hollow was created so you specifically could dream of living there.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Exactly. And actually, I would hate living in Stars Hollow. I would feel so trapped and imprisoned. And so I feel very misunderstood by Gilmore Girls even though it's asking nothing of me. They did not check with me when they made it. But I do. I'm looking at it and it's snowing and it's so perfect. And I know that I would fit in so well and I would be on 100 community rotors.

[Caroline]

But the important thing about Gilmore Girls vis a vis. What I wanted to say was that Kelly Bishop, who plays Emily Gilmore was in a long, long relationship with the guy who plays Rachel's dad, whose name I forget. And there's so many pictures of them being cute together. I invite you all to look at them.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I want to look at them right now. But if I click off the zoom, I'll never find it again. Oh, my God.

[Caroline]

So nice.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And you know what? If Emily and Richard ever got divorced that would be the perfect relationship for Emily Gilmore.

[Caroline]

Oh, girl. Richard dies. Richard dies.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

No, I'm sorry to say, no one will ever die in Friends.

[Caroline]

No one. No one does die in Gilmore Girls. Richard dies.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yeah, but come on, no one should die in the television.

[Caroline]

Yeah, that's so true.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

You can always rewind. You can go back to the beginning and start again. No one has to die in tv.

[Caroline]

Beautifully said.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Does anyone who dies in Friends?

[Caroline]

Ugly Naked? No.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Phoebe's grandma.

[Caroline]

Phoebe's grandma. Ugly Naked Guy was not dead. He was just asleep. And Mr. Heckles dies. And actually, that's a big point for Chandler as well. Because Chandler thinks he's going to die alone like Mr. Heckles. And long before they're together it's Monica who comforts him and says that she's not going to.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Oh, my God. It's so.

[Caroline]

Because he's going to die with Monica. Hopefully on the same day in the same train accident.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Oh, that's the dream.

[Caroline]

That's the dream. Hey, Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. You know, one of the perks about having four kids that you know about is actually getting a direct line to the big man up north. And this year, he wants you to know the best gift that you can give someone is the gift of Mint Mobile's unlimited wireless for $15 a month. Now, you don't even need to wrap it. Give it a [e-mail] Switch upfront payment of $45 for a three month plan.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Equivalent to $15 per month.

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[Ella Riz Bridger]

See mint mobile.com so good, so good, so good.

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[Ella Riz Bridger]

Because there's always something new.

[Caroline]

I'm giving all the gifts this year with that extra 5% off when I use my Nordstrom credit card.

[Commercial/Advertisement Voice]

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[Ella Riz Bridger]

I want to return to Chandler. Right. Because I think we don't talk enough about how freakish Chandler's early life must have been. Like his mother, Nora Tyler Bing, a fantastic name.

[Caroline]

Nora Tyler Bing, one of the best selling novelists of all time.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

She is the bestselling novelist of all time. I think, I can't remember exactly. Is it like 100 million copies? It can't be. That sounds ridiculous. But she says it when she's on the TV.

[Caroline]

Yeah, 100 million copies. Very triggering for us.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Nora Tyler thing is the most famous novelist of all time. She is the most successful novelist. She is a celebrity novelist, which is a concept we don't really have anymore.

[Caroline]

Yeah, not in the same way we have it in the sense that she.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Sold more books than Danielle Steele. She's sold more books than Jilly Cooper. She is on every. She can be on a late night TV show and everybody instantly recognizes her. She is the kind of novelist that your friends who don't read have read every book. Rachel has read every one of her books. Rachel is a huge fan of Chandler's mum, which we don't talk enough about. How weird that must be for him.

[Caroline]

They just don't, they don't do enough with Chandler's mum. They are too focused on the Chandler's dad of it all. They needed to put more into Chandler's mum.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

You know what? I actually, I understand the Chandler's dad storyline is problematic in many ways, but in other ways you do have that very moving scene when they go to tell him about the engagement or her about the engagement.

[Caroline]

Yes, he's talking about that. Yeah, yeah.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

You know, I don't know if Chandler's dad is trans or is a drag queen or what the show is not specific, I guess, because it was the 90s and there was not, like, a clear distinction in what pronouns people were going to use. But nonetheless, there is a deep resolution for me in the storyline of Chandler and his father in that they go to the drag show, they meet Chandler's father on her own terms. They see her as she is. They don't, like, meet her afterwards when she's out of drag. They meet Helena Handbasket. And that's the only name we have for Chandler's dad, I think, is Helena.

[Caroline]

Yeah. Me and Dahlia had a long time talking about this. That thing of, like, it's strange because so much of casting Kathleen Turner in that role which is problematic for so many different reasons and was also quite misogynist for so many different reasons because it was also a direct reference to Kathleen Turner being an actress who had health issues and sort of lost her kind of, like, what people knew is like to be a kind of a bombshell physique because she had health issues and some of her face changed because she had health issues. And their kind of way of sort of winding up that joke with her was like, what if she was a transsexual? You know, like, it's like, such a strange, cruel, weird, misogynist move. But then she plays it with such incredible aplomb and it's so moving, and she's so funny.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And Grace, also that moment where, like, I think a lot about that Vegas moment. We're at the Vegas drag show and they're just making eye contact and Helena realizes and Chandler knows and Monica knows and they're all just, like, being like, we're having this very intimate family moment that we can't have in any other way because this is the only way that you, Helena, can ever be yourself.

[Caroline]

Oh.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Because I don't know if Helena is trans, but I do know that Helena Handbasket is a person who is happiest as a drag artist. Yeah. And is her true self as Helena Handbasket. And they managed to make this beautiful moment of connection because. Okay, so I don't want to lose track of the Christmas thing because what I do think is that Chandler's childhood Thanksgiving, you know, more turkey, Mr. Chandler. It's shot in this very. Okay, don't write in to correct me if I'm wrong. In my memory, that scene of Chandler's childhood, it is so overripe. That scene in the Thanksgiving, it feels like it was shot in, like, a greenhouse. I don't know why it's so clammy and sweltering Is that because I'm thinking about the fact that the pool boy is somehow serving the turkey. Also, why get more stuff? You're a millionaire. But also, like, there's a clamminess to it. A kind of like, well, honestly, why is the pool boy even. That the pool boy should be cleaning the pool? Unless they're eating out the pool. And it's like, unless his and his parents have engineered this situation. So I'm sure everyone is familiar with the storyline, but essentially his father has been having an affair with the pool boy. And for some reason, they decide to tell Chandler this at Thanksgiving dinner while the pool boy is serving him turkey, which is an insane parenting choice. But to be honest, Helena Handbasket, Nora Tyler Bing, they're not people who are thinking about their child. But it's shot in this way that feels almost Lynchian. It's so bizarre to have the help in inverted commas in, like, an all white, like, servant's outfit proffering a platter, saying, More turkey, Mr. Chandler, in a kind of, like, an accent. I'm not entirely sure what it's supposed to be like. Yeah, it sort of sounds like a horrible fake Indian accent. But why would that be the case? I don't know. So it's all very strange. It feels dreamlike. And you don't see either of the heads of the parents. Yes.

[Caroline]

And very cow and chickens.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

It's just a little boy, immaculately dressed, sitting at a table, groaning with food in my memory, surrounded by, like, pot plants and flowers in a hugely luxurious house, while a quite small servant says to him in a sort of mystery accent, more turkey, Mr. Chandler. And from that we understand that that is the moment that Chandler understood that his father was in a sexual relationship with this servant. There's a lot going on there.

[Caroline]

There's a lot. And you know what? I think the way it's shot, it's so weird because it's. I mean, it's pretty fucking ambitious for a sitcom filmmaking. Right.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I can't think of anything else in Friends where it dips into that kind of texture.

[Caroline]

Yeah, right.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Friends has these bursts of artistic achievement. Like when Emma's born. Or is it Ben? I can't remember. And they're all like, oh, it's Ben. When Ben's born. And the closing credits are all shot from the perspective of Ben. It's like he's opening his eyes again and then it goes light and you see them all over the curb. And it's like, oh, look, he's closing his eyes. And then it goes black. And so Friends does have these little, like, flourishes of being like, what if this was art? I could do it. I could make an art.

[Caroline]

Right? Cause you're so. You're really limited when you're making sitcom. And you're just. You're just there with sets, right? You have the same stationary sets that you're using over and over again. So those little flourishes and all your New York scenes are just you on the back lot that look like the set of Annie. And they're like. Yeah. Those opportunities, I imagine, are fairly rare. And also, I imagine you train yourself out of even thinking of them because you're using sets all the time. And so then using that Chandler's Thanksgiving set, it feels like it's intentionally the memory of a child who's remembering it a bit wrong.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yes, you're so right. Because that's why there's no adults present. They don't have his parents there having a fight.

[Caroline]

Mm.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Like, it's not like a classic divorce sequence. It's like a dream. It's like a bad dream. And that bad dream has haunted Chandler his whole life.

[Caroline]

Do you know what it reminds me of?

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Go.

[Caroline]

It's those chapters in. This is such a crazy reference. Those chapters in the Secret Garden when everyone's dying of cholera and she's wandering around the mansion alone with a snake, drinking wine.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yes, you're so right. Which explains why I love that scene so much. Cause I love the Secret Garden. Please buy my book, the Secret Detectives. It's based on that one scene. You'll love it. Thank you. What a great opportunity to plug two of my books. You're so right, though. It's about the Secret Garden. It feels like the Secret Garden in that it's like a child who has everything and nothing. A child who is surrounded by luxury but totally deprived of love.

[Caroline]

Oh, my God. This is so. This is the kind of insights you come to the Christmas special for. It's like imagine. Imagine the Secret Garden. Like the classic version starring Maggie Smith. But it's Chandler.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

But that's what happens.

[Caroline]

Could you be any more friends with that crow?

[Ella Riz Bridger]

But Monica is not Dickon and Ross. But is Ross Dickon? No, Ross is not Dickon. Anyway, the analogy falls down there.

[Caroline]

But Bibi is Dickon. Ross is Colin, obviously. No, Joey is Dickon. Ross is Colin.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Joey is Dick, and Ross is Colin.

[Caroline]

Oh, my God. Monica is Martha. Sure, okay.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yes. But it has that texture of loneliness to it. Chandler is a very lonely character. And I think that perhaps the reason that Christmas Feels like Chandler's time is. Because Christmas is a time where if you're lonely, you get double lonely. Where it feels like everybody else has a million invitations and a million plans. And it feels like, you know, I don't think it's a coincidence that the last Christmas episode is that one where he's in Tulsa where it's like, Chandler could be alone for Christmas. Something he's kind of professed to want this entire time. He's very much like, leave me out of Christmas. Leave me out of Thanksgiving. I don't want to be involved. If I eat a turkey, I'll be sick. I want to eat Mac and cheese by myself. And he's on his own in a room with no Christmas. And he's so sad. He's so sad. And he wants to get back to his family.

[Caroline]

Yeah. And he realizes that his relationship to the holidays is no longer what it was when he was a child, but what it is as an adult because of what he's made it with the people he loves and like, the family he's made. And then, crucially, he ends the episode quitting his job because. And he literally says, like, what? Why should I be the only person who doesn't get to do what they love? And it's like this real thing of being like, oh, you have, like, been two feet into this, like, job that you hate that no one understands for your entire adult life. Your entire life was so unstable that you clung to the first stable thing you ever had, which was this horrible techie job. You've broken the cycle, and now you're like, and you know what? I've decided that I love Christmas, I love my family. I'm going to get a new job that I like. It's literally, it's a wonderful life.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

But here's something fascinating. Consider this.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

The last ever holiday episode of Friends is the Thanksgiving episode in series 10 where Tanta and Monica decide not to host Thanksgiving.

[Caroline]

Yes. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. The first Thanksgiving is them being like, oh, all our parents have ticked off on us.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I'm so nice. Well, there's something really wonderful about recording this Christmas episode with you. And I hope that our listeners will forgive some sentimental. Because it is, after all, sentimental garbage. But also, you're my friend and you're far away. And we have been doing this Christmas special for many years. But we've been friends for even longer. And I'm glad we're talking about friends now, in our 30s, which is when Friends ends.

[Caroline]

Right?

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Is when they get to their mid-30s. Rather than when we started talking about Friends just sort of casually in our early 20s, you know, the idea of your parents saying, I'm away for Christmas was so. It felt so devastating and destabilizing. And in some ways, I think, you know, my parents were abroad. Your parents were obviously in Ireland when we first met. And I think part of our friendship was being like, okay, let's cling together. Let's cling together and make a festive. And the number of Christmas things we have and the Christmas traditions we've had and, like, beautiful Christmas dinners and just Christmas crafts. And we've done so many Christmas projects because I think when we were in our early 20s, the same age the friends are when they begin. Friends was about trying to forge tradition in the absence of our families because we were in London trying to forge new lives for ourselves. And I remember the first time I cooked Christmas dinner for us and our friends. And I truly did not realize this until I rewatched all the Christmas episodes. In prep for this episode, everybody kept asking me for different kinds of potato. And that happens to Monica.

[Caroline]

Literally the exact same thing. When we did that, we had no idea that we were referencing Friends. We just were like, this is what we have in my house.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I remember our friend Harry, friend of the pod, Harry Harris, composer of the pod, Harry Harris, just being like, well, is there going to be dauphinois? And me being like, yes, there will certainly be dauphinois. Like, Googling. Like, what? Dauphinois. How make dauphinois help, please? Dofenois. And just mashed potato for you. Because that was in your years when you were sad just being like, I've got some microwave mashed potato and I'm gonna eat it cold, you know, and roast potatoes, obviously. And just re. Watching that episode where Monica is trying so hard, it made me feel a great deal of tenderness to. Because I would describe myself as. I was a Phoebe who was like, monica is the way to be. I was a Phoebe trainer. Really? Yeah. I really identified with Monica's need for things to be perfect. I never identified with Rachel, obviously, but Phoebe, I identified very strongly with her scattiness. And then in my early 20s, I was just like, if I can just keep a tight enough handle on absolutely everything, everything will be perfect. And I tried really hard to have, like, a perfect house and to make it all nice and to, you know, always be baking something. Even though I was 21 and could have been in a club, I could have had my top off the whole time. If you're 21 and listening to this, just Take your top off.

[Caroline]

Yeah, I mean, like, you've released a cookbook at 25 as a thing that most people don't do until they're like 40, certainly.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And I think it's very telling that every single article about that cookbook was like, she's incredibly young. I know you thought she was 40, but she's not. She's 25. And guess what? Widowed. Crazy. Hey, but it is funny, isn't it? You and I talk a lot when things are. Things are hard, but when things are hard or when things are significant about, oh, I guess this must be a season finale.

[Caroline]

Yes, it is our major coping mechanism for getting through life. I think it's because we, the early years of our friendship and the friendship of our kind of like, immediate group were so tumultuous because my friend, your boyfriend, was diagnosed with cancer when we were all very young and he was all very young. And let's just say it, his parents were not around to help him with that. And no, they were not. And we just became the unit that formed around him and around each other. And I wouldn't wish that on any friend group because it's a devastating thing to go through. But what it does for you is that it brings you closer on a level that you only really get with close family members. So when you say found family about those kinds of people, people who you stared down cancer and death with, it doesn't mean found family is in. I love her like a sister. It means she is my sister. It gives you a real sense of narrative purpose because like, like me and Gav, we're. We're talking so much about, like, trying to manage our relationship now that we're in a long distance marriage effectively. And I keep being like, and this is just the time when we do this, and this is just our, you know, whatever, our Act One break or whatever. And he was like, you can't just think of everything in terms of stories. And I was like, well, you're going to anyway. Like, every single person, they look back on their life and they see it in terms of like, oh, that was the tough time before the good time happened. And that was the, like, this, the. The lonely time before I met this person. Like, we all think of our lives in terms of stories.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Lives are divided into chapters. You know, you just. Yeah, I think it's also the reason why I have two things to say. But the first thing is that the reason it's helpful to think about season finales and seasons is because there are no endings. Right there's just where you choose to stop telling the story. We both know this. You write a lot of fiction, I write a little bit of fiction. But even with a memoir, you choose when to stop telling the story. And I think part of thinking about your life in terms of a season, such as a season of friends, and I do think we're thinking of friends when we talk about it, because Friends ran for so long and those characters grew so much and had so much happen to is. It's helpful sometimes to think, ah, this big dramatic event that's probably just a pause and we'll pick up again tomorrow. Exactly the same. We'll pick up again tomorrow and the cameras will keep rolling and we'll begin again. I think the other thing I was thinking of was, you know that Christina Olsson poem, eating Kit Kats? After the last hurricane, we decided to split up.

[Caroline]

I mean, I love it, but the listeners will have read it.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Well, the listeners should Google it. The narrator is sitting there with her partner or their partner and they're eating KitKats. And the narrator says, this is probably over, huh? And the partner says, please don't make this into some fucking story. And the narrator says, I only meant the storm. And I think about that as the two kinds of ways people approach life, which is you can try not to make it into a fucking story, but it is already a fucking story. And although the narrator of that poem says I only meant the storm, nonetheless there she is, making it into a perfect crystalline poem about that moment where you decide something is never coming back. And I think a lot about please don't make this into some fucking story. Because as a memoirist, I'm always making things into some fucking story. I'm trying really hard to get us to stop writing memoir, but it seems absolutely impossible. I don't know if I'm self obsessed or what, but it just dogs me. I can't stop. It's like every day I'm just like, well, what if I wrote a little bit more about what's happening about my life, my feelings? You know, I'm like, oh, I'll write a Christmas gift guide. And it's like, no, it's actually time to write a sort of think piece about December and my feelings and my sort of what I'm doing. Exactly. Talk about my short fat Christmas tree. And I. I think part of that narrativization, the ongoing does come for me directly from friends because 10 series is a lot to watch characters learn and grow and become somebody different. Chandler, I think for Me is the real change. Obviously, they all simmer down a bit. Monica, I would say she simmers down the least. Monica and Ross.

[Caroline]

Monica gets way crazier, I would say. People talk a lot about, like, how Joey gets dumber. But the thing is, even Joey's dumbness I find very easy on the ear and the eye. But I find the fact that Monica's erraticness gets more kind of neurotic and more competitive and more shrill. I find it so hard. It's why I actually watch the later seasons far less. Because I'm just like, I can't be dealing with Monica. I just can't be dealing with her.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Monica gets very little character development. Ross, I think, also gets very little character development. He just wants the girl and he gets the girl. It's like, will they? Won't they? Will they? Won't they? Will they? Won't they? Yes, they will. Okay, fine. Phoebe, I don't think she changes that much. I think Phoebe simply is like, I will remain true to myself. And Phoebe is a perfect Christmas spirit person. And the reason, I think the festive episodes don't tend to be about Phoebe even when she's jingling a. You know, jingling a bell for charity.

[Caroline]

Oh, I think they are sometimes. But we'll get back to that in a second.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Sometimes about Phoebe. But Phoebe doesn't need the holidays the way that Chandler does. Phoebe already is looking for sparks of joy. Phoebe's already thinking, what's the wonder in this day? You know, Phoebe's someone who, when she sees a beautiful doll's house is like it's out of a box. I've got a bubble machine. I've got a dog. It's built on a burial ground. Phoebe's someone whose life is full of magic and wonder. And this is why her wedding is my favourite of the friends weddings. Obviously, Ross and Emily's is very beautiful, but Phoebe's wedding is for me because it feels the most true to Phoebe in that she finds exquisite beauty in the coffee house and the street and the fairy lights. And it's all just the way it always is. And it's like, that's Phoebe's. Phoebe's secret is being able to look at the everyday as if it's kind of been touched by gold. And, you know, you see this even when you get a reference to Phoebe living on the street. You know, the fact that when she mugged Ross she just wanted to read his comic over and over again like Little Marvel. Also the fact that she never forgets any of her Friends from the street. She never forgets any of her friends. She has a huge circle of people who love her from all walks of life. Phoebe is the embodiment of the spirit of Christmas. She is so generous and she is so thoughtful, and she is full of traditions. You know, her traditions are her own, but they're very specific. I'm thinking particularly of. I can't remember what he does when she's like, oh, that's Lyle. When they're talking about a homeless guy who threatens people, she's like, yeah, he always does that. Isn't that nice? He's still doing it. He's still working. He's still alive. How great. Phoebe doesn't need Christmas because Phoebe is Christmas with all the bittersweetness that implies. You know, it's really hard for her that. You know, that Christmas where she's trying to find her dad because her grandma's.

[Caroline]

She's stuck in the car.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

She's stuck in the car. Cause she doesn't know where to go. She doesn't know whether she wants to go in. And she gets. And the boys are just sitting there being like, that was better. You got as far as the post box.

[Caroline]

I love that scene. So when they just. Her little fingers through the. Or their fingers through the. Kind of. The pay slot in the cab is just so lovely. Another thing about that episode I really love as well is like, I don't know why this is so dear to me. You know, in the closing credits where I think the whole plan was that they were going to hit up an outlet mall on the way back from seeing Phoebe's dad upstate, and they were going to do all their Christmas shopping, but they were in the car too long and they couldn't do it. So they just like, bought everyone gifts from the gas station. And it's like car air fresheners and condoms and stuff. And there's something about that 45 seconds of, like, the credits playing over that while they give everyone their shitty presents. That is just like. That is both my brothers. That is just like. That is my. This. That is my brothers at Christmas. Just like for years of our lives. Just like my brother Shane pretending like he bought me a gift and that he left it in the car and he parked his car somewhere else.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Side note, for the first year of my life, I never used to understand why people left their Christmas shopping for the last week before Christmas. And this year I'm like, oh, it's nearly Christmas and I gotta do some Christmas shopping. And that's adulthood, I guess. Is realizing that people just genuinely run out of time. Anyway, I love that episode because again, I think it is. It's just so brave of Phoebe to go. It's so brave of her to try. And the grandma is so funny and.

[Caroline]

Bad because here's graduation. Another graduation. Another graduation just rounded around my head. Another graduation.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

What? There is also is such love in that lie as well, because Phoebe is a person who lived on the street but actually turns out to have a great deal of family. She has her birth mother and she has. I can't.

[Caroline]

Her birth mother, Phoebe Abbott, having done quite a lot of research on friends this year, she has her birth mother, Phoebe Abbott, who was a teenage mom who was very close and also in a throuple with Lily and Frank Buffet. And then so they had. She had the twins and she gave them the Frank and Lily. Frank and Lily then got married and they split up some years later. And then Lily killed herself.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yes. And then Phoebe's on the street and then she finds her grandma again, question mark.

[Caroline]

Yes, but we. But we don't know why that happens. And we don't know why Phoebe and Ursula went their separate ways either, that they hate each other.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I actually do understand that because if you go through something traumatic with someone, I think it either makes you the closest you've. You can be, or it makes you be like, and I'll never talk to you again. Because every time I look at you, it reminds me of agonizing pain. And I think it's much easier for, like, Phoebe's. This is why she's the spirit of Christmas. She's this, like, cracked open thing to the world. She's just so, like, I have a pure gold heart. You want to see it? You can take it right out my chest. And Ursula has gone the other way, which is to be like, nothing and nobody matters to me. Nothing can ever touch me or hurt me. And in a way, Phoebe and Ursula, they're like two halves of a whole. The happy medium would be to be, like, guarded sometimes and open sometimes. But instead, Phoebe is always open. And that's why she has so many friends, even from the street, because it.

[Caroline]

Seems she will shower when Tibet is free.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

That's at their wedding, isn't it?

[Caroline]

Yeah. When they don't want her friend playing the steel drums because she smells. And Phoebe's like, she will shower when Tibet is free.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

At this point, Phoebe has been living a medium bougie life for, like, at least eight years. She's now marrying this wasp and they have tons of money and it's all 18 bathrooms in this house. And I threw up in the coat closet. But she still is like, no, my friend will be playing the steel drums and she will not be washing because Tibet is still not free. Something I, Phoebe, care about. And I'm glad that my friend is taking a stance. I feel that she is the spirit of Christmas. I feel that Christmas with Phoebe is. Is just like, oh, more of same. Like, you don't need the Christmas kind of illuminates for you, but it doesn't. It's sort of like they're the same. It's just like, oh, two different kinds of fairy lights. They're both kind of slightly bittersweet. They're both kind of this thing of being like, I guess you help people wherever you can and you try your best all the time. Which is Phoebe's real thing. Right. She's always trying so hard. Whereas Chandler is transformed by Christmas and Chana's relationship to Christmas is transformed. Formative Christmas and Thanksgiving. I understand to Americans that these are two very distinct occasions. To me, a person who doesn't understand what Thanksgiving is, they seem exactly the same, just long.

[Caroline]

Right, Right. It's so funny, the whole. The thing of, like. I still can't get over that Americans care about Thanksgiving more than they care about Christmas. It feels satanic to me.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

It's wild. I don't understand. It's wild to have two turkeys so close together. I guess they were abundant in America, whereas why are we eating turkey when they're not that abundant? I'm not a huge turkey fan, so.

[Caroline]

But I'd like us to talk about the Thanksgiving episodes, actually. Because, you know, Thanksgiving is the center of the trauma for Chandler. But also, I do think some of the finest work. And if you want to talk about, like, these sort of artistic flexes of Friends, I do think those flashback episodes are some of the finest work in all of sitcom.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

So if we can agree that Thanksgiving is primarily a lens through which to view the changing selves of Chandler Bing, it is phenomenal that we get to go back in the past and see him with various hairstyles in various guises in his, like, little. Little blue suit. Zoot suit.

[Caroline]

Is it Zoot suit?

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I don't. And it's like little quiff. And Monica, when she's trying to be sexy and she, like, has the carrots between all her fingers and she's like, like dragging a tea towel, going, like, it's rough on my skin. Oh, it's so smooth. And you really see her Desire to practice and become better, to be as good as Rachel. And I just think, a. It's lovely when Courtney Cox gets to do something funny because so often she's just shitty.

[Caroline]

Truly funny. Yes, exactly.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And to see her with the carrots threaded through her fingers, to be like, is this sexy? Is this what Chandler will like? I think it's lovely. And it's lovely that she's been trying to impress Chandler her whole life.

[Caroline]

Her whole life, her whole career is because Chandler says, you should be a chef.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And she goes, do you think she genuinely loves it in the end? Do you think she genuinely loves being a chef?

[Caroline]

That is more a question for you, actually, considering you are closer to the chef profession than I am.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

No, because I would hate being a chef. I actually think Monica would be a very good.

[Caroline]

I think she has the right personality for it. Yeah.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I don't know whether she loves being a chef. We certainly never see her enjoying her work very much. She's always unhappy at her job. I guess the aiming for perfection can feel very cheffy. But I also think she's a very vulnerable, soft person because she was brought up by an abusive feeder. Let's call Judy what she is. She is not abnormally abusive, but she is, you know, she's got some weird attitudes to food and most people with mothers can recognize that to some degree. But there's that part where, you know, she's got those pies and she tries to offer them to Monica, and Monica's decided to get thin so that she can seduce Chandler next year. And her mum is like, oh, you should eat two full pies now after dinner. And it's like, this is the thing. How long have you been doing this to her? How long have you been saying to her, eat more. If you loved me, you'd eat more. And then laughing at her because she does what you say and wants to please you.

[Caroline]

Well, this is the interesting thing. I think that the Judy and Monica relationship is one of the most interesting and durable in terms of the relationships many women all around the world have with their mothers, which is that often motherhood exists on this very interesting fault line between your mother wanting to groom you into being the most delicious thing a man can have so that you'll be okay for the rest of your life taking care. Right, right, exactly. That you can be, like, the most. Yeah. Fit thing for men to have a Mrs. Bennet. And therefore. So you won't ever go, yeah, exactly. It's a. It's the Mrs. Bennet thing, but it's Also that what runs along that fault line is a dual thing of, like, your mother, from the moment she first met you, fed you with her body in many cases. And she wants you to be fed all the time and she wants you to be nourished all the time. And she demonstrates how much she's able to love you by how much she feeds you. And that's why I know so, so many women who, like their mums are commenting on their weight in one breath and then they're saying, you know, have some more Mac and cheese in the next breath. Do you know what I mean? And like, they, like, I've had so many conversations with women about that. And like, it's not that their moms hate them, it's just that they have these two, like, parallel motherhood instincts that just get confused. Yeah.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And I think it's not quite right to say, maybe I was. Maybe I was harsh on Judy a second ago and I. Judy's trying her best and Monica's trying her best, but it doesn't make it easy. It doesn't make it easy for her. And I worry that that relationship would be hard for her to pass in a restaurant setting. I find it hard to think of Monica achieving true fulfillment in a restaurant setting. Like, I don't know what she'll do when they move to Westchester. You know, maybe she'll find a way.

[Caroline]

Oh, yeah, there's no conversation about that.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I could see her setting up like a neighborhood bakery and taking real pride in that of baking. Because she seems to love baking. She doesn't love cooking. Yes, she loves baking. She loves making candy. I would say we don't really see her cook anything that seems delicious at all. Like there's an episode and I can't remember what it is where the food is so disgusting I had to like, stop and Google to see if other people were also reported. I'll spy. Monica's cooking. It's like a grey soup in a glass bowl. And it's the most horrible thing I think I've ever seen in my entire life. I don't think Monica. Is Monica a great cook? She gets terrible reviews.

[Caroline]

She got at least one terrible review for sure. Oh, yeah. Is she a great cook or is she simply the friend who cooks well?

[Ella Riz Bridger]

That's it, isn't it? And you know, it's easy to confuse the two. Like, have I based an entire career on simply being the friend who can cook? Maybe it's like, I'm certainly the best cook in my friendship group of 23 year olds. Who don't know what a kitchen is. So I guess I'll write a cookbook and that's my life.

[Caroline]

And now there was no other 22 year old who was pan fine pigeon breasts in her, like, kitchen come living dining space. So it had to be you, I'm afraid.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And I guess that is one reason I feel a great kinship with Monica is the sense of, like, being a host. And that's why I think the arc from the first Thanksgiving episode to the last is so, so important and interesting. Because the first one Monica's like, dare I host? Dare I be mother? Dare I cook all these foods for people? And then the last Thanksgiving episode is. I think it's very fascinating and very sad about your early 30s is. Monica and Chandler jointly decide they cannot host Thanksgiving anymore. That they can't do it. They're too busy, the work stuff is too stressful and they need to take a break from tradition. And the other friends go absolutely free nuts. And they're like, no, that's our tradition. Traditions have to change. I get fed a lot of, like, content for parenting toddlers on Instagram for some reason.

[Caroline]

Like, which is crazy considering you do not have any toddlers.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

No, but I do a lot of crafts.

[Caroline]

Zero toddlers.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And I saw some woman on Instagram just being like, one of the best things you can do for yourself when you have kids is like, redefine tradition as something we like to do some years.

[Caroline]

Well, that's nice.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Isn't it nice? And this is why I don't, like, delete the parenting content. Because often I'm like, that's actually useful intel for me as a human being parenting my own self. I'm a person who can get really stuck on, like, but if we don't do it every year, it won't be special. And like, this year, lots of my stuff is in storage. Like, I'm having a very exciting but quite strange year. And it's like, oh, I just. Maybe we will not unpack everything. Maybe we will not go to the attic and get stuff out of storage. Maybe we'll just be like, here with the things we have. And we'll do the Christmas special on Zoom. Because here's the thing. Monica is persuaded to make a Thanksgiving dinner. And she tries really hard. And Chandler helps her. He only makes the cranberry sauce, but God bless him, he really is like, I'll be there. I'll be there cooking. And that's what she trusts him with. And everybody's late because everybody's got different preoccupations there's different stuff going on. They want to take Emma to a beauty pageant. By the way, a story that would never be Phoebe's line. They obviously wanted to give it more to Monica. But you couldn't have Phoebe doing the Christmas, the Thanksgiving cooking. So, fine. But Joey is like, I got tickets for a game. Because Joey, at this point, I can't remember what Joey's career is. But he's a guy who can get tickets to games they're always going to.

[Caroline]

I think he's back on Days of Our Lives at this point.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yeah. Joey's an actor who's like, oh, yeah, it would be great to see my friends. But also, I got given these free tickets for this thing and I don't see why we shouldn't go. And it's a far cry from the beginning where it's like, we have nothing and nobody else. We have nothing to do and nobody else to see. And we just are going to be in this one room clinging together like life rafts. And I think a lot about that episode and I've been thinking a lot about it in terms of that. Like, thanks. That parenting influencer saying a thing we like to do sometimes. Because I think one reason I am very glad that Friends ended when it did is that it allows a graceful way for things to change. Like, there are some real moments of, like, changing Friends. That this is not a festive episode. But, you know, when Monica moves in with. When Chandler moves in with Monica and she's like, and I have to live with a boy. And I love to see that their friendship remains the same and as solid. And I believe that their friendships will all remain the same and as solid as they ever were in different ways and in different shapes and different forms as they have kids or don't have kids. And, you know, maybe there's a future where Ben and Carol and Susan and Ross and Rachel and Emma all move to Paris. Or, like, not to rehash the Ross Apologist episode which was very important as a Ross apologist but, you know, they have got a very unusual and very powerful relationship. Those guys. He walks her down the aisle. He walks his wife down the aisle to the person she had an affair with because that's how much he loves her and his son. And, you know, Carol is trying to, like, raise a child who she has no legal right to. And Ross is making that happen. And I feel very tender about them.

[Caroline]

Yeah, me too.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

But then again, there you have a perfect example of we start the show with Ross being like, I am getting a divorce because my wife is having an affair. And actually he does get a divorce because his wife's having an affair. But what happens is they become friends and co parents who raised like not an attractive child, but nonetheless a child. I'm really, I'm a real. I'm a Ross apologist, but a Ben Hayter.

[Caroline]

I'm such a Ben hater. I am a real Ben hater.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I find Ben to be very unpleasant as a child.

[Caroline]

The thing is, it's not nice to call children ugly, but that child is an adult man now, so it's fine. When Ben has that very pale bowl cut for his like or his toddler years, I find him horrible. Monica Bang.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

That one is bad.

[Caroline]

Monica Bang. I hate Monica Bang as an entire thing. I hate the Ben storylines. I hate looking at Ben.

[Harry Harris (Oystercatcher)]

I.

[Caroline]

When Ben is like a kid with short hair who like has lines and stuff, I'm like, fine with him then. Holiday Armadillo. I'm so down with Holiday Armadillo. That is the only Ben storyline I really fuck with.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I'm glad you brought up Holiday Armadillo because I love, love that episode because.

[Caroline]

Again and you and I watched that episode recently and we realized it was one of the few episodes that is directed by David Schwimmer that's really meaningful.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Because it's the episode that's about. Is it the only episode about Judaism? They're not a big faith.

[Caroline]

I think it is.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

They're not a big faith based show. There's not a lot of Christ in there either. There's certainly nobody of any other, any other faith based.

[Caroline]

What's really interesting about faith in Friends and obviously neither of us are Jewish. So it's, you know, this is very much finger in the air observations from two gentiles. But like the, the show, even though Rachel's Jewish, Monica's Jewish and Ross is Jewish, the show rarely feels like it is Jewish unless the older people are involved. Like, unless it's Rachel's parents who are involved or the Geller parents who are involved. They, they bring so much of that culture with them, you know, and like the, the way, the way they deliver jokes, the jokes that they're delivering, the way they talk about like doctors, the way they're sort of like kind of. They just, they make it feel like a more like rounded Jewish show in a way that like it, they. It doesn't feel that way when it's just the six friends together. Except for the Holiday Armadillo episode which is directed by Schwimmer and also, like, it literally opens on. You see the kind of the flat decorated for Christmas, but you also see a Hanukkah blanket. And, like, it's like, oh, we've never seen that before.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yes. It's fascinating, isn't it, to have the Hanukkah blanket right there where it doesn't appear. Most of the items in Friends appear routinely. You know, we're all familiar with all the posters of Friends and all the horrible lamps of Friends and, you know, that weird.

[Caroline]

The horrible lamps of Friends.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Wow, Carol, I've changed my mind. I want my lens to be horrible, horrible lamps of Friends.

[Caroline]

Oh, my God. Does it feel like when Monica starts giving Rachel shit for bringing home that nude girly lamp? Like, yes. Is it a silly, dumb, ugly lamp? Of course. But is it? I don't see it as being any worse than any of the other lamps already in that house.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

No. Monica has no leg to stand on vis a vis ugly decor lamps.

[Caroline]

I do.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

One thing I love very deeply about Friends is the decor. And I, again, another great candidate for my lens. Decor of Friends. Interior decor of Friends. But I hope that we can talk about it a lot. We can talk about it here, too. Because, of course, there's so much in there, so much texture. It's like when you look at an old photo of, like, your childhood and you're like, you. You'll get this feeling, you're like, you and your siblings are looking at old photos and you're not really interested in what you look like or what each other looks like, but you're, like, looking back and you're like, oh, look, I remember that. Like, I remember that zebra. It used to chew its ears. Or like, I remember that dress. It was awful. Like, I always wanted to, like, rip it. And then one day I buried it in the garden. Do you know what I mean? And you're looking at also being like, oh, wow, did the kitchen look like that? Was it that small? Why is that there? And you're, like, looking at all the, like, tiny artifacts. I don't know. I sometimes feel like Friends has that same quality to me, particularly Monica's apartment, that same doll's house quality as a Nora Ephron movie. You know, I think we talked about this in our Nora Ephron episode. But, you know, the you've got male apartment where I always want to, like, make it into a book. Like a paper book that opens up where you can see, like, oh, there's her daisies. There's her computer. Oh, like, turn it, pull this flap, it really goes blue. And that's how I feel about Monica's apartment too. And I think it's particularly true at Christmas when you start discovering all new locations. Like when you discover that the bench by the window can lift up. Oh man.

[Caroline]

Oh my God, that's such picture book stuff.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And then when you find Monica's messy closet and the fact that it's even the fact that it's not messy in that episode I find very charming to be like time changes.

[Caroline]

Do you know what? Something that I find really charming now that we're talking about decor. You know how like obviously there are flashback episodes when it goes back to when they were teenagers. But the flashback episodes that are kind of like oh, three years ago or five years ago when it'll be like Chandler will have a goatee or something where it's like they'll have the couch in a different place and they'll just kind of slightly rearrange the floor furniture in the way that people really do. But also it just like for the set decorator is they're like, yeah, that we're trying to give it like a sense of a sense of that this set, even though it is completely static, is somehow always in flux because real people live here. Take control of the numbers and supercharge your small business with zero. That's Xerox. With our easy to use accounting software with automation and reporting features, you'll spend less time on manual tasks and more time understanding how your business is doing. 87% of surveyed US customers agree. Xero helps improve financial visibility. Search Xero with an x or visit xero.comacast to start your 30 day free trial. Conditions apply.

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[Ella Riz Bridger]

I want to talk about the way that Monica's perfectionism on the holidays. I want to talk about when she's making candy for all the neighbors. And I want to talk about when she's making cookies as tips because they don't have any money. Monica's holiday arc is this. She cares so much about getting it right. She cooks everybody their favorite kind of potatoes. She makes the cookies and people are returning them crushed. And she is crushed. Then it turns out, no, Trager liked them. He loved them. He thought they were thoughtful and treasured. And she's like, oh. Oh, you really like my thing? Then she makes the candy, and everyone is so crazy for the candy, and she wants to stay up all night because they're like. People are saying they're like little drops of heaven. And she loves that. She loves that so much. She loves how much praise she's getting. I think you can also factor in here, Dick Clark's rocking New Year's Eve, where she's so.

[Caroline]

The routine, of course, where she's so.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Desperate to be perfect that she's like, I'm doing my routine. This is my routine, and it's dreadful. Obviously, shout out to Ross, who is really, as discussed on this show, a nice little mover.

[Caroline]

This is something you and I have become obsessed with on this rewatch, which is that because Ross is, like, the awkward, geeky character, but actually. And as everyone always talks about, his physical comedy is sort of just over and above anything that should be, like, possible in this century without having grown up on vaudeville first. But, like, it's incredible. But also, you can't be a great physical comedian without also being kind of a sexy person because, like, it's all about. Oh, my God.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

There is a correlation. You're so.

[Caroline]

There is a correlation because it's all about, like, an awareness of where your body is and isn't. You know, it's just all about, like, the face, the space you're filling, the spaces you're not filling, and how to, like, negotiate that air together. It's like physical comedy and dance. Like, they're. They're. It's all motion, it's all expression. And so when you watch, obviously, the routine in Friends is. Is, like, supposed to be this ridiculous thing that him and Monica share. And it's, like, hilarious, and we love watching it. But you watch Courteney Cox perform and she looks like someone doing a bad dance routine. You watch David Schwimmer perform it, and he looks like somebody who's doing an incredible, like. Like a bad routine, but with incredible fluidity. Like, he clearly has some kind of dance background. And then there's this other scene. I was fighting with Monica Heise about this. I asked her to rank all of the Friends in terms of how good at sex that she thought that they were. And then she put Ross at the bottom. And I was like, monica, get real. I was like, monica, get real. Just because you're not physically attracted to the character yourself because he's dweeby and annoying, which I guess that's fine. You can't say he's bad at sex. Clearly he's good at sex. Everyone wants to have sex with him all the time. He has the most beautiful girlfriends in New York City. And there's this bit.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

We're never short of women.

[Caroline]

Never. And there's this bit, it's one of my favorite episodes. It's where Richard and Monica are still going out and he stays over. And also Ross stays over and it's quite awkward because obviously Ross has known Richard his entire life and now he's having sex in an adjoining room to him. It's that whole thing with, like, Rachel and Monica having fights about condoms and stuff. And there's this bit where Rachel, they're talking about her old relationship with Pablo and she says a very, like a very relatable gaffe from a woman who thinks she's saying something nice but isn't saying something nice at all, which is, oh, you know, what you and I have is so intimate and so special. And with me and Pablo, it was just meaningless animal sex. And he's so. It's so real that you would say that to your boyfriend and think it was a compliment. And he would have it as the biggest insult to his masculinity ever.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

It's the worst day of his life, to be sure.

[Caroline]

Worst day of his life. And then eventually they get to the end. She sort of, like, is standing on the bed and she, like, takes his face in her hands and she's like, kissing him and she's like, you know, what we have is amazing. And da, da, da. And then. And he says. She says, with you, it's the best it's ever been. And then he says, until now. And he grabs her ankles and he flips her on the bed. And it's so fish.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

It's so sexy. It's so sexy. Monica, I think you've made an error there because you personally don't fancy Ross.

[Caroline]

Look, I don't really fancy Ross of a day to day either. But I cannot say he's not good at sex.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Do you want to be?

[Caroline]

He's definitely good at sex.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

He's good at sex and also, like, he's good enough at sex that Rachel wants to have sex with him in the museum, which. How carried away do you have to be. To be like, we're gonna wake up in the display tomorrow. They don't even start off in the display.

[Caroline]

He's so good at sex that a woman who's pretty certain that she's attracted to women stays with him for a long time.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Dick is a prison. Caroline good. Dick is a prison.

[Caroline]

I think that's probably why it took Carol so long to realize that she's exclusively attracted to women. Because she is having pretty good sex with Ross.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Oh, my God.

[Caroline]

And she's like, it's not my favorite, but it's not bad. Because importantly, obviously, the notion of bisexuality is too advanced for friends. But. But, like, Carol never says she's bi. She says she's a lesbian.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yeah, I think that's canon. Look, Ross is good at sex. That's one of the things we've all established now is that Ross must be good at sex because all these gorgeous women want to sleep with him.

[Caroline]

Okay, here's what I think. Can I give you my rundown of how I think the friends are at sex? I'm not going to rank them, because I think that. I also think it's babyish for us to live in binaries of people either being good or bad in sex. It's all a dance, and we're all looking for our best partner. But Ross is good at sex. Joey is good at sex. Phoebe is good at sex. Rachel, I think, is a pillow queen. I don't think Rachel does a lot in bed.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Rachel certainly gets by on being the hottest cheerleader.

[Caroline]

Yeah, absolutely. She gets by on that. Totally. Also, Monica is good at sex. Chandler is not good at sex. But Monica makes him good at sex.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Well, we know that because she makes him the map.

[Caroline]

Yes, of course.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Monica must be good at sex for this reason. He knows her own body well enough. Generally, women's bodies well enough to be able to draw a map of, like, okay, you want to be better at sex? Here's how you do it.

[Caroline]

Because Monica lost her virginity so late. But she was like, when we meet Monica, when she's fat Monica. Fat Monica is like, a delicious person. She's so, like, bubbly and full of, like, weird. Like. Like private girl passion. You're like, oh, that's the girl who's been masturbating for a long time. And reading a long time. Reading a lot of erotic fiction from the library.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

What I will say is, fat Monica read Flowers in the Attic over and over, absolutely obsessively. And fat Monica.

[Caroline]

Monica read Shirley Conran's Lace.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Certainly. I Mean, remember when she gets a kink for Santa? She wants. Oh yeah, that's in the holiday armadillo. Where she's just like, you think you could wear this later? And Chandler reasonably says to his Jewish girlfriend about her Jewish dad, did your dad ever dress up like Santa? And she says no. And he says, then that's okay. And thing to be like, and now she has a king for Santa. And she's just going to lean into that. So she must. She knows herself. Which is the key to good sex, right, Is to know yourself.

[Caroline]

The way I've been like, I don't know. This sort of metaphor came to me not too long ago and it's been playing on my mind ever since. Sometimes I think of the place of sex in our lives is like. If you think of like, think of a map of London and you think of all these little not, not royal parks but like nature preserves that you see in these London neighborhoods. They're like, and here is our stag beetle loggery. And here is where we must preserve so the. So the blackbirds can build their nests or whatever. It's like the role, the role of sex in the human life is that this is in this kind of way lives that we lead that is swilling with information and small devices and blinking red lights and like things that. Things and tasks that like primates and chimps are not supposed to do. Like, sex is the one part of our lives where things get to be sort of natural and where like, this.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Is what a chimp would do.

[Caroline]

This is what a chimp would do. And I honestly think that people who over academicize their life when it comes to sex are headed down a path of mostly misery. Misery and open relationships organized by Excel spreadsheets. And I think just like, let it be what it wants to be. And I think when you get a character like Monica who is so uptight in every part of her life, but she has this one layer of life that is her nature preserve. I think she's really good at it.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yes. And I also, yeah, I think she spent a lot of time thinking about her own body in a way that is not always conducive to being good at sex. But certainly she knows what feels good. Much like Adrienne says on the yoga videos, find what feels good. Monica.

[Caroline]

Yeah, because it's like the one part of her life where she experienced joy with her body that has nothing to do with food.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Oh my God. It's the one part of her life. Here you go. It's the One part of her life where she's always been able to experience joy.

[Caroline]

There you go.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Like without complicated shit.

[Caroline]

Now we have it.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Without thinking about, like, this is, you know, thinking to Monica's early forays into masturbation. And not where I thought this Christmas episode was going, but. But nonetheless, I believe she's, you know, reading flowers in the attic and reaching for a pillow.

[Caroline]

I'm so glad that we've really clarified for everyone in the last podcast of the year and probably for another six months, just sort of like Monica's relationship to masturbation.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I actually think it's important because she has to have some pleasures that aren't just being neurotic. Monica's good at sex. We've agreed.

[Caroline]

Yeah. Okay. So glad that we got there.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Say something. I don't know how good a sex Joey is. He's super handsome and people like going home with him, but they don't go home with him that much. Like, they go home with him one time and they're like, what a fantastic time. Maybe. And I understand that some of that's because he doesn't call them back. But if you're as good looking and as charming and as like, forthcoming as Joey, do you need to be good at sex in the way that Ross has had to evolve to be fantastic at sex?

[Caroline]

I think what Joey is, is, as you say, good looking and handsome and large. And what he is is very biddable and very trainable.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Which, should Joey ever end up in a long term relationship, will really be good for his partner. Yeah, like obviously I discount the sitcom Joey because it's nothing to me and I never saw it and I don't care about it. Do you think Joey would end up in a relationship or do you think that that's just not in Joey's nature? I know we're just speculating wildly as to the future of our friends because of course our friends will live forever in their, in their youth.

[Caroline]

No, the thing is, I do think he will end up in a relationship. I think he will probably get tricked into a relationship by someone who maybe has evil intentions. But I also think, I think he will have children and I think he'll have closer relationships with the children than he will with his wife or ex wife.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Oh, a very good point. The only. I was going to say, what if he ended up in a relationship with someone like Estelle? His old age, an older woman, an older starlet for Joey.

[Caroline]

Oh, I would love that.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And they're living in their big house. It's like her Big house, but it's all, like, mad and exquisite. And he, like, gets to be a toy boy even when he's, like, 50.

[Caroline]

You know what really struck me re watching all these episodes? Estelle is young. Estelle is young. Her actress is young. I don't know how old she is, but they put her in a mental wig with a crazy manicure and a big cigarette. But if you actually look at Estelle's face, that lady is our age.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Wow. Well, that explains why they're also shocked at her death.

[Caroline]

Precisely. Yeah.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Poor Estelle. One of the few characters in Friends permitted to speak, who is not one of the key friends. And, you know, given how expensive it is to have someone speak in a TV show, they must have really liked it.

[Caroline]

So this is a layer of Friends I've only come to understand since I started making a TV show, which is that, like, you write these scripts and you then have to, when you eventually go through many, many drafts of them, you have to make them producible at a certain point where you have to start looking at them not as an artist, but as somebody who is trying to make the cheapest possible show. Not a cheapest, but a show that comes under budget. And at one point, your lovely producer will say to you, listen, you have, like, four. You have all these characters who only have one line. You have, like, Amy in episode one, who says this. You have Beth who says this. In episode two, you have Meg, who says this in episode. I'm just picking the little women so I don't give spoilers away from my own show. And they say, listen, it costs, like, €2,000 just to get anybody to speak on screen. That is the minimum that we have to pay a special extra. Can these people just not be compiled into one person? And then they can be the person that delivers all the kind of extra bits of, like, color and little bits of story and little bits of dialogue. The Gunthers, if you will. Every show, whether it's like, Succession or Friends or whatever, has its subcast of Gunthers who aren't that important, who don't really have their own storylines, but they're adding sort of color and they're adding information. And what's weird about that is, like, oh, that's why in all these episodes of Friends, you have these people parties where no one speaks. Like, literally, these people do not speak these, like, because it's, like, expensive to have someone speak on screen. But then it's, like, something to go back to what you and I said at the beginning of the Episode, which is like, when you think of your life in terms of seasons of a TV show, like, there's a friend that you and I have that, like, we didn't see him for years, but he came back into our lives recently just because. Like, just because he just did. We just saw him at a couple of parties, and me and Gav started going for drinks with him, and now he's back in our lives again. And the thing that you keep saying is, like, wow, he's back for season eight. He left to do movies, but now he's come back. And I was like, yeah, he left to do movies, and now he's come back. And the thing about that is, it's like, oh, if I were making a TV show of my life, I'd be like, let's bring back that character. Because we've cast him already and the audience know who he is, and we'll just, like, get him in there to say some stuff and to pick up a new storyline. So it's like that weird thing of, like, TV art and live and live and live in ours.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I think, like, you know, I must consider that I am in a relationship with. I am marrying someone who made a movie with you when you were both, what, like, 21, 22.

[Caroline]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We wrote a movie together when we were 21, and that movie was made, and we went to a film festival in Wales together to promote it, and then we mostly lost touch. And then years later, you met him on a dating app, and now he's the man you're marrying.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Something about putting together, like, guest lists for a wedding. Spoiler. I'm getting married. I've not actually said that anymore.

[Caroline]

Oh, yeah, Ella's engaged, by the way.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yeah, that's a nice Christmas tree, people. And it's like, oh, I'm pulling together all these people, and it's like, oh, they're all reemerging in the plot. You know, not to keep quoting poetry. There's a Roddy Lumsden line I have always liked, which is just, people rise and fall in the plot. And it makes me very happy to think about people who maybe I haven't seen lately, who will come back and who will rise and fall and when it makes, like, the thing about tradition being something you do sometimes and not all the time. It's just one of those things where you can be like, oh, friends. The friends are friends. They'll come back, they'll rise again. Gunther will get another go. Janice will be back again. And, you know, there are Friends who don't. There are friends who don't come back in our viewing, but who maybe come back later on in the friends lives.

[Caroline]

You don't know.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

We only get 10 years with these people, and that's nothing in the grand scheme. I know. There's a point I was in the middle of making earlier, and we got sidetracked, which is about how Monica's first Thanksgiving, you know, she does her first Thanksgiving when she's so uptight. Then there's the cookies, then there's the candy, and then her last Thanksgiving. She is so capable by then of making a perfect dinner. And everything is so perfect. And Chander is helping, and everything is so perfect. And she didn't want to do it, but she can by this point. She's 10 years into hosting Thanksgiving. She can make a Thanksgiving dinner in her sleep, basically. And Phoebe and Rachel go off to the baby show so that Emma can win a prize. And Joey and Ros are at the ice hockey, and they come back and everybody's late and they have to put their heads through the door.

[Caroline]

Yeah, I love the heads through the door. The floating heads are great.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And the dinner is so perfect. And then they all burst through the door and it all gets ruined. And at that moment of ruined, Monica is taking a call from the adoption agency to say that they will get their baby. And she doesn't care. She doesn't care. Everything is ruined, and Monica doesn't care. And that's her arc, is to look at, like, the chaos and just be delighted that her friends are there with her for this moment that will change her life forever. This moment she's been longing for since she was a little girl and that she thought she would never have. Because Monica's great fear is that she's unlovable. Monica and Chandler, I say that it is. Yeah. Monica's great fear is they're two broken toys. They're two broken toys, and they both feel that they're unlovable. And then they get to experience this moment of, oh, we're gonna be parents, surrounded by the people who help them realize that they could love each other and be loved. And there's food everywhere, and it's all disgusting chaos. And Monica can't even see it because she's so happy. I'm crying. That's where we're at.

[Harry Harris (Oystercatcher)]

Aw.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

That's Monica's arc. Chanda's arc is to care about Thanksgiving and Christmas, and Monica's arc is not to care. Monica's arc is to think they balance each other out they. They come to this place where Monica can deal with things being ruined because something so much more important is happening, which is love. And Chandler can care because he's checked his job. He's just free and he's trying something new. And that's really hard in your mid-30s is to try something new.

[Caroline]

And I'm doing it right now, baby.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I know. And, like, this year's had loads of bits of, like, job that I never thought I would be able to do. And I'm doing it. And it's great. And, like, it's hard, man. It's hard to be, like, what if. What if I had more dreams? And I find it very moving, you know, I'm aware we haven't talked about Rachel at Christmas and that's because I haven't got anything to say about Rachel at Christmas. No, no.

[Caroline]

I don't think there's much there for Rachel at Christmas.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

There's nothing there. But she's also a present.

[Caroline]

But Rachel's big storyline at Christmas is that she likes to return gifts. And that's it.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Funny, because she doesn't change. And that is interesting to me is it's just like, yeah. You know that one friend who does that annoying thing and they all just kind of accept it. They all accept she's going to return stuff because you just. Sometimes people change for the better. Sometimes people change for the worse. And sometimes people don't change. And you just have to be okay with all of those things if you want to form relationships with humans in an ongoing capacity. I don't know, man. I feel very moved when I think about. I think about Monica not caring about that mess because her life's going to get a lot messier. Monica with twins. She'll have to stop being trill. Because the one thing you know, they explicitly say they don't want a parent like the Gellers. And they explicitly say they don't want a parent like Chandler's parents. They want to raise kids who are happy and well adjusted. And I don't know that they'll do it, but I know they'll try. And that's half the battle.

[Caroline]

I love them.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

And that's festive. It's festive.

[Caroline]

That's festive.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

It's festive to try your head.

[Caroline]

Yeah. I just keep thinking about the last five minutes of It's a Wonderful Life where George Bailey, like, runs through his town being like, merry Christmas, you all. Savings and loans and Merry Christmas this. And he goes home to his family and wraps his arms around them. And like, every time a bell rings, an angel gets his wings. He's like, oh, that's Chandler coming back from Tulsa.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Chandler coming back from Fellow.

[Caroline]

I had realized that it actually is such a classic Christmas story of, like, a man learning the value of It's a Christmas Carol, it's the Wonderful Life. Oh, my God. But the difference is, it's like we've been on this journey with him on a drip feed for 10 years.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I find that really imagine watching those first episodes not knowing that Chandler's gonna love Christmas so much he has to leave his job to do it.

[Caroline]

It's actually such a good. Of all the payoffs, it's one of the best.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

It really is to leave your career that you've been in for so long. And that was worth it to you to move. Move stateful. Which, like, America's huge. That's like moving country anywhere. Normal. You don't have to get a passport, but you still have to fly a long way. I get. I think, no, Tulsa and New York are very far apart.

[Caroline]

You have to fly so long.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Exactly. And he does it, though. The thing is, like, he's so scared, and he's putting his all into that job, and he's put his all in that job for so long, even though everyone hates it and he hates it. And he's just doing it because that's what he.

[Caroline]

And everyone hates him in it.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Everyone hates who he becomes when he's there. And he's still just like, no, but that's my job, though. That's what I've got to do. And then he's like, no, there are actually. There are actually things I care about a lot more than this, such as my wife and my best friends. He doesn't even have kids at that point. He's just like. Such as my wife and my home and our best friends. And I want to have Christmas like that. And I find it very nice, find it very important.

[Caroline]

I'm so glad that in this Christmas episode that Chandler has finally gotten his due.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Yeah, I feel a great tenderness for Chandler because his story is one of learning to love and be loved. And that is a very universal Christmas tale and a very. And in many ways, the story of friends and the lens through which I would most like to see Friends is like, people learning to open up their poor, bruised little hearts and let people in. And happy Christmas to you all.

[Caroline]

I think we should leave it there, quite frankly. I've got to eat my dinner. You've got us. Finish up sewing your stocking. Happy New Year. And Happy Christmas to all the sentimental garbage heads out there. I've never really come up with a name for you people. I don't think it's my place to do so.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Garbage men.

[Caroline]

The garbage men out there. But I think what we should do is play out friends through a lens with a Christmas song from our friend. Our friend Harry Harris has released a Christmas song this year under his artist name, Oystercatcher. And it's called Merry Christmas, I love you, I'm falling apart, which is pretty much exactly how I feel this year. And a song he wrote kind of about the fact that we as a gang started making Christmas traditions ourselves. And I've been listening to it a lot this week, and I would really like it. And I would feel very connected to the sentimental garbage listeners if they listen to do it as well.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

I love you. I love Harry. You and Harry were there with me in the darkest times. And now you're with me in a time that is, you know, nicer and stranger. And I love my friends. I love my family. I'm very happy to be here in this weird Christmas where everything is changing. And I know that I could have said that anytime in the last 10 years. This weird, beautiful Christmas where everything is changing. Because that's life. Happy Christmas, guys.

[Caroline]

Happy Christmas, guys. I love you all. Bye.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Bye.

[Harry Harris (Oystercatcher)]

It's not Christmas till the markets set.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Up stores.

[Harry Harris (Oystercatcher)]

Till they hang the lights up in the shopping mall Till so far Practice start their pantorum they got a Mitchell brother Playing the dame of the town gate theater Battle done and ooh this year's gone all wrong Woo. So we make it up as we go along we build our own to this now seems the time to start Merry Christmas. I love you. I'm falling apart. It's not Christmas till the ocean get out Curse the balls and drive the bar the drought Consider drinking cinnamon and.

[Commercial/Advertisement Voice]

Wine.

[Harry Harris (Oystercatcher)]

Oh, whatever your garden serve it up with Sticking around to close Ooh this is gone all wrong.

[Caroline]

Ooh so.

[Harry Harris (Oystercatcher)]

We make it up as we go along we build our own tradition now seems the time to start Merry Christmas. I love you. I'm falling apart it's not Christmas but it's not all bad when the drinks they clink like jingle bells in the water Mully or plastic bag we spend December wrapping up against the weather Coley's clothes are on yeah we'll get through this together and it's not Christmas like it was when we were small.

[Caroline]

When.

[Harry Harris (Oystercatcher)]

We didn't know how far we could go it's not Christmas we're not family.

[Caroline]

Oh.

[Harry Harris (Oystercatcher)]

But we say our praise we wrap our gifts we decorate the tre all this year's gone all wrong Ooh so we make it up as we go along we build our own tradition now seems the time to start Merry Christmas. I love you. Merry Christmas. Oh, I love you. Merry Christmas. I love you. I'm falling apart oh, oh, oh Falling apart oh.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

Oh the car from Carvana's here.

[Caroline]

Well, will you look at that? It's exactly what I ordered. Like, precisely. It would be crazy if there were any catches.

[Ella Riz Bridger]

But there aren't, right?

[Caroline]

Right. Because that's how car buying should be with Carvana. You get the car you want, choose delivery or pickup, and a week to love it or return it. Buy your car today with Carvana Deliver. Your pickup fees may apply. Limitations and exclusions may apply. See our seven day return [e-mail].