OUT OF THE MAIL TUBE

I'm starting to get comments on my blog.....

I'm a big fan of all the characters from "Friends" and I found your blog while searching for articles about the new show "Joey". I think "Joey" is going to do a lot better than you give it credit for. You'll see! Those crossovers you seem to get hard for will come about because other shows will want to get linked to "Joey"!

And besides, technically, you got yourself a crossover from "Joey" already and I don't mean just that its a spinoff from "Friends". When Joey finally met up with his sister, it was at the airport. So that counts as a link to "LAX", don't it? Right?
Gail

There was a review in New York Newsday which stated that 'Joey' was the best of the new sitcoms... but that wasn't saying much. It's an opinion I agree with.

But I will agree with Gail that NBC will now try to swing any sitcoms from the coattails of 'Joey'. In fact, I'll go out on a limb and say that as far as NBC goes, 'Joey' will wrest the locus of their sitcoms from New York back to LA where they all seemed to be situated just prior to 'The Mary Tyler Moore Show'.

Since the early '90s, just about every NBC sitcom was set in Manhattan ('Frasier' and 'The Golden Girls' being the most obvious aberrations) so that they could take advantage of crossovers with 'Friends' or 'Mad About You'. ('Seinfeld' resisted the crossover gimmick, but the 'Mad About You' producers found a way around that. And for some reason, 'Cosby' seems to have been a victim of sitcom apartheid.)

'Madman Of The People', 'Caroline In The City', 'The Single Guy', 'Union Diner' - all connected to 'Friends' or to each other. And those that weren't set in NYC were dragged into the Big Apple somehow for a crossover. ('Hope & Gloria' with 'Friends'; 'Frasier' with 'Caroline In The City')

So maybe now, the sitcoms outside of Los Angeles will find some way to send a few of their characters out to the Left Coast so that they can cross paths with Joey Tribbiani.

And yes, Gail, you were right that technically 'Joey' did cross over already with 'LAX' as soon as he landed at the airport. Now normally, crossovers based on locations rank just above crossovers of celebrities appearing as themselves with their appearances on talk shows and variety programs. I'm just not that desperate.

However, the whole thrust for 'LAX', its reason for existence, is the airport; NBC could have showcased the lovely Heather Locklear in any kind of a program but they chose 'LAX'. Therefore, the airport has to be a considered a major component of the series and thus it's a factor wherever it now appears in a series, new and old.

But we won't push it.

BCnU!
Tele-Toby