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The Superbowl episode changed everything for Friends. While the sitcom was successful almost right out of the gate, certain episodes have been hugely important to its longevity. The 1995 two-parter that aired directly after Dallas Cowboys trumped the Pittsburgh Steelers made an already thriving show outlandishly lucrative.
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Friends' creators explained how the highly-rated second season show was a total game-changer as well as how they managed to get some of the biggest names in Hollywood to cameo.
Why Friends Was Given A Post-Superbowl Episode
In his interview with The Hollywood Reporter, co-creator David Crane admitted that all he and his colleagues wanted in the early years was not to be canceled. But given Friends' rapid success, these worries were soon put to bed.
In fact, Friends was such a success that the then-NBC Entertainment president, Warren Littlefield, decided to air an episode directly after the Superbowl.
This is deemed one of the most coveted spots on television. At the time, it was normal for a new show to get the time slot. The theory was that the huge Superbowl numbers would carry over and give a baby show a massive growth spurt. However, this didn't always work.
So, Littlefield and NBC decided to try something different. Instead, they gave the hour spot to one of their biggest shows.
"Instead of trying a new show, we asked ourselves, 'Why don’t we just give people what they want?' There was nothing hotter than Friends," Warren explained to The Hollywood Reporter.
"We were a success on Thursday night and we go from that to, 'Do you want to follow the Super Bowl?' in a year and a half," David Crane said.
"It was a great honor to be asked," executive producer Kevin Bright said. "Everybody knows that you get the widest available audience to sample a show.
Co-creator Marta Kauffman revealed that her rationale for doing an hour special after the Superbowl was about more than just ratings.
"I wanted to do it because I had heard a statistic that Super Bowl Sunday is the day associated with the most number of partner ab*se. My thinking was that if this helps one woman from being b*aten, I’m all for it."
Why The Friends Superbowl Episode Was An Hour
NBC had a full hour after the Superbowl that they didn't want to give it up by only airing a 30-minute sitcom. Therefore, they asked that Friends do an hour special. And given that the special aired directly after the biggest TV event of the year, it couldn't be "subtle".
"The Superbowl forced us to do a kind of episode that we wouldn’t normally do," David Crane explained to The Hollywood Reporter. "People had been conditioned to watching just 30 minutes. That was our first challenge."
"We wanted to make sure there was big, promotable, and funny stuff in all the stories," the co-writer of the first part, Mike Sikowitz, explained. "The last thing you want is for all those millions of people to watch the Super Bowl and then watch your show and go, 'Well, that was pleasant and contemplative.'"
The result was a number of star-studded plotlines that took the characters out of the coffee shop and the apartment.
"This needed to be our Friends half-time show," David added. "The fact that we called it 'The One After the Superbowl' as opposed to anything that had to with the other stories shows you our approach to it.
Friends' Celebrity Cameos In The Superbowl Episode
Brooke Shields, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Chris Isaak, Dan Castellaneta, Fred Willard, and Julia Roberts were all invited to be part of the two-part Superbowl special.
"We never, over the course of doing the show, wrote for a specific guest," David said to The Hollywood Reporter. "We came up with stories we thought were funny and put it out to our casting to find the best people. But for this episode, we couldn’t just go with a really good actor. We needed names."
Brooke Shields, who played Joey's stalker, told The Hollywood Reporter that she said 'yes' as soon as she got the phone call.
"I was sort of obsessed with the show. There was no way I wasn’t going to do it," she explained.
"We were all aware that Brooke had never done this kind of role before. Chris Isaak was an interesting choice because we were all fans of his music," Kevin explained.
For the Rachel/Monica storyline, Jean-Claude Van Damme was chosen.
"The part we wrote for him wasn’t necessarily different than how he was in real-life," David Crane admitted.
As for Julia Roberts, it was Matthew Perry who ended up convincing her to guest-star.
"Matthew asked her to be on the show," Kevin explained. "She wrote back to him, 'Write me a paper on quantum physics and I’ll do it.' My understanding is that Matthew went away and wrote a paper and faxed it to her the next day."
At the time, Matthew and Julia were reportedly flirting with one another. Shortly after her appearance on Friends, they started dating publicly.
"I remember when I got a call and they said, 'Oh, we got Julia Roberts,' and it was like, 'Are you f—ing kidding me?,'' Warren Littlefield said to The Hollywood Reporter.
As a result of the star-studded two-parter following the biggest TV event of the year, Friends earned an insane 52.9 million viewers. Of course, this also increased their weekly ratings by a mile and ultimately made Friends one of the most successful sitcoms of all time.
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