‘Chandler Bing,” wrote Matthew Perry in his puckish, self-mocking memoir, “changed the way that America spoke”. The actor’s bold words were true – but only up to a point. Yes, there was a period in the late 1990s when people overemphasised the verb to comic effect: “Could that be any more annoying?” But that was really more of a verbal tic. The Matthew Perry/Chandler Bing paradox was that he demanded not to be taken seriously, and in doing so, became the ego ideal of generation X, which is a pretty serious job. So even though he had – no question – the best lines in Friends, he was never what he would have been in an earlier era: the sidekick.
So much of the plot structure rested on Chandler being the second string: the maladroit loser to Joey’s lothario, the joker skating beneath Ross’s romantic gravity. He was never intended as the leading man. He and Monica were never story-arced to get married. The One With Ross’s Wedding: Part 2 was meant to just be a one-night stand. Friends co-creator Marta Kauffman said years later: “We thought it was going to be funny, then we were going to get rid of it.” In the event, they actually had to stop taping because people in the delighted audience were screaming.
