Friends With Benefits

With the mass appeal of Friends, everybody wanted to jump on the bandwagon. A guest appearance next to the most famous sitcom "family" in the world could launch anybody's star into the atmosphere. Over its decade long history, plenty of big stars have come and gone in the purple apartment, but here are some of my favorites.

The Top Ten Friends Guest Stars

#10 Jill Goodacre as Jill Goodacre (Total Episodes: 1)

First Appearance: "The One with the Blackout" (S1:E7)

One of the few "big name" stars of the first season, Jill Goodacre got in on the fun before the world even knew how game-changing the show was eventually going to be. A model with very few acting credits to her name, she brought a friendly charisma to her cameo in one of the funniest Chandler storylines of the first season (except for Janice, of course).

#9 Giovanni Ribisi as Frank Buffay, Jr. (Total Episodes: 9)

First Appearance: "The One with the Bullies" (S2:E21)
Last Appearance: "The One Where Ross is Fine" (S10:E2)

Although Giovanni Ribisi has had roles in popular movies as widely varied as Lost in Translation, Avatar, and Ted, he will always be remembered, at least by me, as Phoebe's spacey brother Frank. Ribisi's startlingly odd performance provided an edginess to the show that certainly helped to propel it through its second season into its Golden Age.

#8 Morgan Fairchild as Nora Bing (Total Episodes: 5)

First Appearance: "The One with Mrs. Bing" (S1:E11)
Last Appearance: "The One After I Do" (S8:E1)

Morgan Fairchild is just plain regal is what she is. A television queen in her domain, she brings a smoky sensuality and riveting force to her character, Chandler's romance novel-writing mother. Her innate sexual power provides a hilarious antithesis to her son's gawky fumbling and self doubt.

#7 Alec Baldwin as Parker (Total Episodes: 2)

First Appearance: "The One with the Tea Leaves" (S8:E17)
Last Appearance: "The One in Massapequa" (S8:E18)

People were surprised when Alec Baldwin displayed his comedy prowess by starring in the class A sitcom 30 Rock, but they really shouldn't have been. Not when he proved it so extensively in season eight as Parker, Phoebe's endlessly enthusiastic and bubbly boyfriend. Some guest stars were just that - celebrities showing up on the show to play around. But by his second and final episode Alec Baldwin found himself fitting into the show's sharp comedy style like a glove.

#6 David Arquette as Malcolm (Total Episodes: 1)

First Appearance: "The One with the Jam" (S3:E3)

I have a perhaps unhealthy obsession with David Arquette. But don't let the fact that I own a framed picture of him and keep it on my bedside table distract you from his amusing cameo as a stalker who mistakes Phoebe for her twin sister Ursula. Despite his relationship with co-star Courteney Cox, he has a goofy chemistry with Lisa Kudrow that keeps the episode fresh and light, keeping the comedy at the forefront in what could have been an unintentionally dark subplot.

#5 Paul Rudd as Mike Hannigan (Total Episodes: 18)

First Appearance: "The One with the Pediatrician" (S9:E3)
Last Appearance: "The Last One: Part 2" (S10:E20)

Who doesn't love Paul Rudd? Phoebe Buffay certainly does and she married him to prove it! Although he was introduced late in the show, Rudd's character Mike is so endearing that by the end of the show he feels like part of the gang, a Herculean feat considering what a pop culture titan Friends had become by the end of its run.

#4 Brad Pitt as Will Colbert (Total Episodes: 1)

First Appearance: "The One with the Rumor" (S8:E9)

Although in retrospect it's a little bleak, the then-married Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston had a lot of fun as he played Will Colbert, an ex-fat high school classmate of Rachel's who hated her guts. Although their contentious split made her a tabloid superstar, it does somewhat diminish the humor although it's still a great inside joke in context.

#3 Jennifer Coolidge as Amanda Buffamonteezi (Total Episodes: 1)

First Appearance: "The One with Ross's Tan" (S10:E3)

Jennifer Coolidge has the Midas touch for comedy, turning everything she's in to gold. Not that Friends needed it, but her one episode stint as Amanda, an egocentric old roommate of Phoebe and Monica's who has developed a hilariously fake British accent. Seeing her dance with wild abandon is worth every cent it takes to buy a TV to watch it on.

#2 Bruce Willis as Paul Stevens (Total Episodes: 3)

First Appearance: "The One Where Ross Meets Elizabeth's Dad" (S6:E21)
Last Appearance: "The One with the Ring" (S6:E23)

Bruce Willis actually appeared on the show for free because he lost a bet to Matthew Perry on the set of The Whole Nine Yards. If that's not the most awesome story you've ever heard, I envy your life. His stint as the manly father of the student Ross is dating is one of his best comedy roles as he reveals his emotionally stunted inner self. Paul's the man!

#1 Danny DeVito as Roy (Total Episodes: 1)

First Appearance: "The One Where the Stripper Cries" (S10:E11)

If there ever was a role Danny DeVito was born for, it's... Well, it's Frank Reynolds in It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. But his role as Phoebe's bachelor party stripper is a close second. Please, invite him to all my future events.

Word Count: 916

CinemaBeach: I Lost My Mind In San Francisco

Blue Jasmine

Year: 2013

Director: Woody Allen

Cast: Cate Blanchett, Alec Baldwin, Sally Hawkins

Run Time: 1 hour 38 minutes

MPAA Rating: PG-13

Blue Jasmine barreled onto the scene, giving Woody Allen the all-time biggest box office debut of his career and sweeping up critics in its wake, but now that the tide has settled, a closer inspection reveals that it’s not all it’s cracked up to be. Not that it’s not a good movie, not by a long shot. Blue Jasmine has a strong sense of style that shines under the hand of a veteran director. The cast is mostly superb and it is never boring, but it has big ideas about class divisions and interpersonal relationships that never really crystallize by the time the credits roll.

Cate Blanchett plays Jasmine, a wealthy socialite whose husband (Alec Baldwin) is arrested for shady corporate dealings. She loses her house, her money, her stepson, and her husband and has to move in with her sister Ginger (Sally Hawkins), a working class city girl whose romantic life consists of a revolving door of lowlife guidos. Having never held a job, she’s not quite sure what to do with herself and after several unsuccessful ventures, she manages to convince the worldly (and handsome) Dwight (Peter Sarsgaard) that she’s an interior designer, thus beginning a professional (at first) relationship.

Her road has frequent ups and downs (literally – her life is a haze of Xanax and high-functioning alcoholism) and we encounter frequent flashbacks to her life before. The higher the peak, the less we see. The harder the fall, the more time we spend in Jasmine’s dreamland of bubble baths and diamond bracelets.

Taking on what could be a deliriously campy role (Jasmine has a habit of talking to herself as if she were still at an extravagant dinner party) and moderating it perfectly, Blanchett is a rock in a briskly moving river of fast-paced cuts, flashbacks, and branching side plots. Baldwin, Sarsgaard, and Hawkins are quite at home in their roles as well, as is Louis C. K. in a surprisingly rich turn as a bumbling sound engineer. Unfortunately the movie suffers under the lesser efforts of a bloated supporting cast (Andrew Dice Clay as Ginger’s ex-husband is a particular disappointment).

Various thematic threads are picked up, held onto for a while, and summarily dropped as the movie spans across such topics as reinventing oneself, the hypocrisy of the laments of the rich, and the futility of trying to change someone who is already lost. Each of these themes valiantly vies to anchor the film and each of them is quietly buried and forgotten.

Disregarding the subtext, the text itself is a little shaky on its feet with its share of minor but niggling plot holes. The largest of which is that Jasmine is apparently so utterly computer illiterate that she can’t even Google “online design school,” even after months of computer classes. One could argue that she is deliberately causing herself to fail because of her guilt over her husband’s fate but one would be reading far too much into a film that doesn’t quite find its thematic footing throughout its 98 minute run time.

Blue Jasmine is definitely worth seeing if only for Blanchett’s wonderful performance, but remains in the mind about as long as a pleasant dream upon waking up.

TL;DR: Blue Jasmine is interesting and pretty but empty.

Rating: 7/10

Should I Spend Money On This? Yes, but only because Cate Blanchett is a treasure.

Word Count: 590