Friday, February 21, 2020 Jumada II 27, 1441 AH Doha today 160 - 250 COVER Friends, again STORY Friends is the gift that keeps on giving to WarnerMedia. P2-3 CUISINE SHOWBIZ Demand for nutritious energy Divyanka bags best bars increasing globally. TV actress award. Page 6 Page 15 2 GULF TIMES Friday, February 21, 2020 COMMUNITY COVER STORY Friends of influence PRAYER TIME Fajr am Shorooq (sunrise) am Zuhr (noon) am Asr (afternoon) pm Maghreb (sunset) pm Isha (night) pm and affluence USEFUL NUMBERS Whether Friends can replicate its status as a streaming phenomenon on Netflix, where young fans became Emergency 999 obsessed with it, remains to be seen. But the show’s track Worldwide Emergency Number 112 Kahramaa – Electricity and Water 991 Local Directory 180 record for regenerating its success is one for the TV International Calls Enquires 150 Hamad International Airport 40106666 Labor Department 44508111, 44406537 history books, writes Stephen Battaglio Mowasalat Taxi 44588888 Qatar Airways 44496000 Hamad Medical Corporation 44392222, 44393333 Qatar General Electricity and Water Corporation 44845555, 44845464 Primary Health Care Corporation 44593333 44593363 Qatar Assistive Technology Centre 44594050 Qatar News Agency 44450205 44450333 Q-Post – General Postal Corporation 44464444 Humanitarian Services Offi ce (Single window facility for the repatriation of bodies) Ministry of Interior 40253371, 40253372, 40253369 Ministry of Health 40253370, 40253364 Hamad Medical Corporation 40253368, 40253365 Qatar Airways 40253374 ote Unquo Qu te “He who has a why to live can bear almost any how” — Friedrich Nietzsche There is a lot going on in the world and Friends Community Editor provides escapism Kamran Rehmat e-mail: [email protected] — Lisa Gregorian, president Telephone: 44466405 Fax: 44350474 and chief marketing officer ‘ for Warner Bros Television ’ Friday, February 21, 2020 GULF TIMES 3 COVER STORY COMMUNITY organ Kolkmeyer, on Friends. The rate for all shows a meteorologist measured in the period, including for Chicago TV other popular sitcoms, was one per station WGN, has 56,000 views. fond childhood AT&T has shown its appreciation memoriesM of curling up next to for Friends as well. It put Central her parents on a couch as they all Perk pop-ups in its AT&T mobile watched episodes of Friends. phone stores in several major cities Two decades later, Kolkmeyer, including Seattle, which already 28, found herself perched on a had a coff ee shop inside. Customers replica of the signature orange were asked to put their phones in sofa from Central Perk, the pouches to fully experience the coffee house hangout of the six programme’s pre-social media 20-something characters on the ethos. series, as she introduced four of Seeing a world where people talk her favourite Friends episodes to to each other instead of looking WGN viewers on a Saturday night down at their phones every few in November. minutes is part of the current “I don’t watch a lot of TV shows, appeal of Friends. Kolkmeyer said and I don’t know a lot of actors and even her fellow millennials can actresses,” Kolkmeyer said. “But I feel nostalgic for that brief period know every line of Friends.” early in their lives when landline Kolkmeyer is among the show’s phones predominated and digital legion of multigenerational fans technology played a less invasive of the Warner Bros. Television role in everyday life. sitcom, and her hosting stint “Friends brings you back to a was part of a massive marketing time when you had to show up at campaign tied into the program’s someone’s house to know what they 25th anniversary. The push were doing,” she said. “You kind precedes the arrival of the beloved of wish it was the way people still series on WarnerMedia’s new interacted.” streaming service HBO Max, GOING STRONG: Friends creators David Crane and Marta Kauff man say have watched in awe as the series they created Friends creators Marta Kauff man which has the faces of the Friends 25 years ago still resonates with viewers. and David Crane say have watched cast members as the opening in awe as the series they created image in its first promotional really don’t want to go to sleep like 357,000 viewers overall, have seen revenue from Friends, up from $258 25 years ago still resonates with spot. that. So they are looking for a palate a 7% increase among women aged million the previous year. viewers. They have heard athletes Whether Friends can replicate its changer. It relaxes them.” 12 to 34. And viewers are paying attention from outside the US say they status as a streaming phenomenon Gregorian’s full court press TBS is airing all 236 episodes of to the ads, according to data. A learned English from watching the on Netfl ix, where young fans for the anniversary included the series in order, off ering 12 each study by TVSquared, an Edinburgh show. They have listened to fans became obsessed with it, remains to Kolkmeyer’s couch at WGN, one day through March 6. (Viewers who and New York-based advertising recount how the characters helped be seen. But the show’s track record of 250 that were custom made and prefer to have Friends curated for measurement fi rm that tracks the them get through diffi cult times in for regenerating its success is one provided to TV stations around the them on traditional outlets such as performance of commercials for their lives. for the TV history books. After country. WPIX, which airs the show TBS, Nick at Nite and their local TV direct-to-consumer marketers “I think people want to spend 10 seasons as a major hit for NBC in New York, used the Central Perk stations will still be able to watch such as Wayfair and Casper, time with them,” Kauff man said. from 1994 to 2004, the programme set on a Friends-themed edition of them after the series goes to HBO showed that viewers are more likely “They’d like to be in that coff ee has earned roughly $5 billion from its morning programme. Overseas Max.) to respond to messages on Friends house drinking coff ee. They’d like showing repeats on stations and networks that carry the show As new mass appeal hits become than other programmes. to be sitting in Monica’s living networks in the US and worldwide. received backdrops of the fountain scarce on traditional TV, the During January through August room and talking to these people. It commanded $100 million in seen in the opening credits along recognisable comfort food provided 2019, TVSquared found that direct- And I think people can really 2018 for its fi nal year on Netfl ix, with grass rugs. by Friends is valued by advertisers. to-consumer advertisers received identify with that time of your refl ecting the ability of classic Warner Bros booked a block of In 2019, Nick at Nite and TBS one customer inquiry for every life, with looking for love, and hit TV shows to capture younger episodes on 1,600 movie screens generated $265 million in ad 4,600 views of their commercials looking for work, and how do you audiences. through Fathom Events, the balance all your friends. I think it’s In 2019, WarnerMedia paid $425 speciality screening company. In identifi able.” million to make it part of its new September, the presentation called Friends has even survived service HBO Max for the next fi ve Friends 25th: The One with The current-day critics who disapprove years. HBO Max, which launches Anniversary took in $2.9 million in of the show’s gay jokes, lack of in May, is also reportedly ready to box offi ce receipts. “I don’t watch racial diversity and fat gags that pay up to $2.5 million to each of the Central Perk pop-ups around the would have trouble meeting current Friends stars — Jennifer Aniston, country and sold 38,000 tickets a lot of TV social standards. David Schwimmer, Courteney in three hours. There was also one shows, and I They’re not wrong,” Crane said. Cox, Matthew Perry, Lisa Kudrow held at the Tribeca Film Festival “Our perspective has changed. The and Matt LeBlanc — to appear in a in New York. Merchandise tie-ins don’t know a only thing I can say is certainly reunion special where they would included a Lego set version of nothing was ever done maliciously. reminisce about their time on the Central Perk that sold out six days lot of actors The last thing we’d want is the show. They would not even have to after its release. A special Friends and actresses. show ever to make anyone feel bad. learn any lines. DVD off er on Amazon was gone in I think we’ve learned a lot, as the Even as streaming thrust a half day, generating $1.1 million But I know world has. And if we’d had a more Friends back into the nation’s in sales. contemporary perspective then, cultural conversation, the series Warner Bros estimates that in the every line of would we have done some things remains a durable performer on four months after the promotional diff erently? Absolutely.” traditional TV, where it continues campaign was launched in August, Friends” But the Friends universe of 1990s to draw viewers who are willing Friends was viewed 1.5 billion Manhattan will never be altered. to sit through commercials. The times across cable networks and While Kauff man and Crane said anniversary has reminded fans streaming services — 17% higher — Morgan they are game for participating in that while they wait for its new over the same period the year a reunion special, they will “never streaming home there are plenty of before.