Second Look: Friends Season 5, Episode 2 – “The One with All the Kissing”

Friends Season 5, Episode 2 “The One with All the Kissing”
Written by Wil Calhoun
Directed by Gary Halvorson
Aired October 1, 1998 on NBC

The beginning of Friends‘s fifth season is incredibly busy with plot; everyone except Joey has a major piece of story happening, between Monica and Chandler’s budding relationship, Ross’s marriage, Rachel’s return to the United States, and Phoebe’s pregnancy. All of those plots come crashing together in “The One with All the Kissing”, a hilarious episode full of characters trying to cover something up from most everyone else in the group – and more importantly, an episode that marks a noticeable shift in the Friends hierarchy as Monica/Chandler begin moving to the forefront of the show’s narrative.

Opening with Monica trying to hide underwater in Chandler’s bathtub from Joey, “The One with All the Kissing” builds on this idea of members of the group concealing things from each other; Rachel’s feelings for Ross, Phoebe’s resentment towards the group – and of course, Chandler’s outlandish attempts to keep his new relationship a secret. Friends clearly knows what it has at this point with Monica and Chandler – and it shows, the comedic energy of their scenes highlighting not only their story, but everything else in the episode around it.

“The One with All the Kissing” plays out by slowly revealing these truths in between moments of Monica and Chandler reveling in brief bursts of infatuation when nobody is looking. The most obvious of them is Ross, whose attempts to win back Emily are quickly turning into exercises in futility; after apologizing profusely to Rachel (who does not let on what an awful time in Greece she had), Ross spends the episode trying to win Emily back by mailing her 72 long-stemmed roses (say it with me: “one for every day I’ve known and loved her”), only to get them sent back to him in a pile of shreds.

Though Ross is still getting the message that Emily’s not coming back, it’s pretty clear Friends is cutting bait and abandoning this story as quickly as it possibly can, which makes for a disappointing end to Emily’s arc on the show – and also, begins to raise questions about the viability of the show to maintain two internal romantic plots on the show simultaneously, given the show’s history of giving Ross and Rachel so much emotional gravity (for better or worse) through the first five seasons. But there’s a distinct lack of excitement here as it appears to wind up the ol’ ‘will they, won’t they’ machine again, so much so that even when the episode is focusing on Rachel’s confused reaction to her current emotional state, it’s stealing glances away at Monica and Chandler – in its own way, “The One with All the Kissing” tries to hide its true intentions for the core story of season five, which is much more discernable in hindsight.

Regardless, it’s Rachel and Ross who do get a resolution to their story in this episode (we’ll have to wait a few episodes before the group famously discovers Monica and Chandler’s new relationship), when Rachel stops letting Monica decide her life, and against her better judgement, tries to confront Ross about her lingering feelings for him. That is, until she tells him she’s still in love with him, and busts out laughing; if there’s one non-Monica/Chandler thing I appreciate about this episode, it’s how it tries to hand-wave away Rachel’s last dozen episodes of shenanigans as a fever dream of sorts, Rachel snapping back to reality and suddenly realizing she’s been fantasizing about a married man for weeks, and someone who she has no actual interest in reforming a relationship with.

Now, “The One with All the Kissing” can’t help but leave an inkling of mystery with Ross’s subdued, confused response to Rachel’s reaction to her own proclamation; but for the most part, it treats the scene as a pullcord for a plot that was clearly heading nowhere, a creative reset following the scramble to the clumsy cliffhanger to end season four. It’s not particularly elegant, but it’s certainly necessary, and also represents a (again, mostly) clean shift for Friends to move its attention to the newer, more exciting pairing happening in front of everyone. In that capacity, this episode works perfectly, cutting off what wasn’t working at the knees and removing itself from its own delusions, in fitting with the thematic material of the moment.

The rest of “The One with All the Kissing” is spent on Phoebe feeling left out, an extremely pregnant woman who isn’t taking “a picnic in Central Park” as a proper reciprocation for having to listen to everyone’s constant inside jokes and stories about the London trip. Though its metaphorical connections to the episode are thin at best – Phoebe does try to hide her annoyance for some time, after all, and certainly doesn’t want to contend with her water breaking when they’re finally ready to go to Atlantic City – it makes for an amusing runner, a bit of comradery that sees the group come together around Phoebe… just in time for her to go into labor, properly setting the stage for Friends‘s 100th episode to follow.

Though “The One with All the Kissing” is mostly remembered for the humor derived from its titular plot, there’s a sense of momentum and narrative chemistry in this episode that is undeniable, with all of its characters (except Joey, of course) finding a way to glean benefits from the newfound sense of romance lying at the show’s center. Though it remains to be seen whether Friends will find a more consistent delivery of these ideas than it has in previous seasons, it’s certainly off a solid start with entries like ‘The One with All the Kissing”.

Grade: B

Other thoughts/observations:

• The Monica/Chandler bath scene is one of Friends‘s best cold opens – Chandler’s reactions, Monica’s chicken request, and Chandler’s “I’ve had a very long, hard day” are all absolute gold.
  
• Monica freaking out over Rachel touching the London photos; also terrific.
  
• “Remember when my water broke???”
  
• Rachel’s “I floated up out of my body” monologue is not an easy one to pull off; Aniston absorbs so much of the cringe-y elements of the scene – it’s impressive the scene works at all, given how silly the proposition of it all is.
  
• “I just wanted to bring a little culture to the group.” “That’s fine, just don’t bring it in my mouth!”
  
• Another good kissing joke: “That’s not European.” “… felt French!”
  
• Ross’s reaction to everyone teasing him about Emily outrunning him are great.
  
• Extended thoughts: the extended version of the episode is three minutes longer, with just about every scene getting a little bit more comedic meat on the bone. One oddity; the episode opens with Joey noting he left his dinner date because she threw up?
  
• Up next: Friends (and my Second Look reviews) hit the century mark in “The One Hundredth”.