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"The One With Phoebe's Uterus" is the eleventh episode of the fourth season of Friends, which aired on NBC on January 8, 1998. In it, Frank asks Phoebe to be their baby's surrogate mother, Joey gets a temporary job as a tour guide at Ross' museum, and Chandler is nervous to have sex with Kathy for the first time.

Plot[]

Phoebe's brother, Frank marries Alice and they give Phoebe the good news they have. Reveling with joy, Phoebe asks them if there's anything she can give them as a present, which they answer promptly - as the two are unable to conceive, they ask Phoebe if she could be their baby's surrogate mother. Confused what to do, Phoebe seeks her birth mother for advice, who gives her a pug puppy to keep for three days. She explains to her how she would feel when she has to give the puppy up, which would be nothing compared to giving up a baby. When Frank and Alice see the puppy, Phoebe gives it to them (albeit it being her mother's), and seeing the looks of glee and joy on their faces, she decides to carry their baby for them.

TOWPhoebe'sUterus1

Joey and Ross "People in white coats and blue blazers"

Joey gets a job as a tour guide at Ross' museum. Things are going well until lunchtime, when Joey asks Ross to sit next to him in the cafeteria. Ross, however, blows him off to sit with his professor colleagues. Joey talks about this to Rhonda, a fellow tour guide, who remarks how people from different departments don't sit next to each other. Joey is hurt by this, and nothing Ross says to him can make him feel better about it, until Ross refuses to sit with his colleagues to sit with Joey the next day at lunch.

Things are going really well for Kathy and Chandler. Just one thing's missing - the two haven't had sex yet. Chandler is put off by the fact that Kathy's ex was Joey and since Kathy's sexual performance standards are pretty high because of this, he's afraid he won't be able to reach them. When they finally do have sex, Chandler sees that it was just *okay* for Kathy, so he talks to Monica and Rachel about this, and Monica decides to help him out by drawing a picture of a woman and telling Chandler all about the various erogenous zones on a woman's body and techniques which women find extraordinary. He takes her advice the next time he sees Kathy, who rushes in the apartment at the end of the episode to thank Monica for the great tips she's given Chandler.

Cast and Crew[]

Main Cast[]

Jennifer Aniston - Rachel Greene
Courteney Cox - Monica Geller
Lisa Kudrow - Phoebe Buffay
Matt LeBlanc - Joey Tribbiani
Matthew Perry - Chandler Bing
David Schwimmer - Ross Geller

Supporting Cast[]

Teri Garr - Phoebe Abbott
Giovanni Ribisi - Frank Buffay Jr.
Debra Jo Rupp - Alice Knight
Paget Brewster - Kathy
James Michael Tyler - Gunther
Sherri Shepherd - Rhonda
Miles Marsico - The Smart Kid
Jack Ong - Andrew (Older Scientist)
Jim Bentley - Ted (Tour Guide)
Chip Chinery - Scott (Scientist)

Crew[]

Directed By:
David Steinberg

Written By:
Seth Kurland

Quotes[]

Phoebe Abbot: It combines my two passions: pottery and erotica.
Phoebe: Erottery!

Monica: All right. You could, uh, start out with a little 1, a 2, a 1-2-3, a 3, a 5, a 4, a 3-2, 2, a 2-4-6, 2-4-6, 4, 2, 2, 4-7, 5-7, 6-7, 7... 7... 7... 7 7 7 7 7 7... seven.

Trivia[]

  • In this episode, Matthew Perry messes up a line by saying "blue blazer black" instead of "blue blazer back". The rest of the cast's responses were so funny that they left it in the episode.
  • This is the 3rd and last time Joey works at one of his friends' job, the 1st time being with Chandler in "The One With The Chicken Pox" and the 2nd being in the previous episode at Monica's restaurant.
    • This is the only time he doesn't lie about his identity while working there.
  • In the uncut version of the episode, Ross also asks Rachel about who eats where at her place of work when explaining to Joey that the situation in the canteen at the museum isn't unique.
  • The whole "Phoebe is having her brother's babies" story line was created to keep Lisa Kudrow in the show while she actually was pregnant. It was also the reason she stayed in the US during Ross' wedding because she actually was in her 3rd trimester and wasn't allowed to fly.
  • In "The One With The Hypnosis Tape", Joey and Ross explain to Phoebe how they end up best man and ring-bearer respectively. However, as the two don't have a formal wedding ceremony because they choose to elope out of impulse while visiting City Hall, Ross and Joey aren't present at Frank and Alice's wedding, much less in their designated roles.
  • The DVD episode has an extended clip of the part where Monica gets excited while explaining to Chandler about women. The three find Monica's demonstration exciting so they leave for different rooms. - Monica and Rachel to their respective bedrooms while Chandler makes for the bathroom.
  • Monica's demonstration of the erogenous zones not only improves Chandler's sexual relationship with Kathy, but in "The One Where Phoebe Hates PBS", Chandler refers to Monica making him the best sex she's ever had.
  • This is the first time Phoebe is shown taking care of someone else's dog. She does this again with her friends' dog Clunkers in "The One Where Chandler Doesn't Like Dogs" in Season 7. Phoebe also borrows another friend's dog in "The One With The Birthing Video" in an attempt to cheer up Joey.
  • Chandler compares the puppy to the late Karl Malden.
  • Rachel says that when she has a baby, it will be with someone she loves and the baby is a keeper. She has a daughter, Emma, with Ross (the love of her life) 4 years later.
  • In this episode, businessman Donald Trump is mentioned in one of Chandler's jokes. A season later, Chandler would once again mention Donald Trump, which led Joey to discover that Chandler and Monica were dating at the time.
  • When Rachel is watching Phoebe with the puppy, she says it's like Sophie's Choice. Ross compares the choice between giving up dinosaurs and sex as being like Sophie's Choice in "The One Where Chandler Gets Caught".
  • The book Rachel reads in the closing scene, Anthem: An American Road Story by Shainee Gabel and Kristin Hahn, is the same one she was reading in the cold opening of "The One With Joey's New Girlfriend".
  • This episode was used as "S is for Seven" in the Nick at Nite Friends A-Z Event (January 2023).

Goofs[]

  • When Phoebe visits her mother, she says "I didn't know that you did pot." in this shot, Phoebe Abbott's arms are loose, but in the next shot, her arms are crossed.
  • When Phoebe and Phoebe Abbot are talking, Phoebe Abbot is heard to start saying "I gave up two babies" before the shot changes to show her actually speaking the line.
  • When Phoebe is on the couch in the coffee house talking to Monica and Rachel, the way Phoebe is holding the puppy changes between shots.
  • When Monica is drawing the erogenous zones and Rachel says "Let me see that!", Rachel has one leg on the couch. When the camera angle changes, she has both legs on the table. In the same scene Rachel's dressing gown changes position with almost every shot.
  • Chandler states in a later episode that he is afraid of dogs, but he was calm when being in the same room as Phoebe's puppy in this episode.
  • When Phoebe enters the apartment Rachel is standing in front of the TV. Chandler says "you're going to give them a Sony PlayStation and a baby?" Instant cut to Phoebe and Rachel is standing next to her with no time to move.
  • When Joey is talking to Rhonda, you can see someone with a lab coat enters, however when the scene cuts to Ross no one else is standing in the cafeteria so Ross enters twice.
  • In the final coffeehouse scene, Rachel's legs go from having her right leg crossed over her left leg to having her left leg crossed over her right leg and back again, switching with each shot. Her arms also changed position between shots on several occasions.
  • When Ross and Chandler are talking about "not making love as well as Joey", Ross and Chandler stick their arms out towards each others but in the next shot Ross's hand is back to the mug

Gallery[]

Stills[]

Screenshots[]

External links[]

Episode Navigation[]

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24
Preceded by
"The One With The Girl From Poughkeepsie"
Series Four Episodes Followed by
"The One With The Embryos"
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