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"The One With The Halloween Party" is the sixth episode of the eighth season of Friends, which aired on November 1, 2001. Monica and Chandler are having a costume party for Halloween, which brings up all kinds of problems.

Plot[]

Monica and Chandler decide to host a costume party for Halloween. Monica buys Chandler a pink bunny costume and makes him wear it, which he doesn't like at all (she wanted to get him a brown and white bunny costume to dress as The Velveteen Rabbit, his favorite childhood book, but the pink bunny costume was all she could find). However, when Ross comes as "Spud-nik," his clever play on words combining the Russian satellite Sputnik and a potato, Chandler thinks that he doesn't have the worst costume anymore.

Phoebe bumps into Ursula, who is getting married in a week, so she invites her in return for Ursula's invitation to the wedding. Ursula brings her fiancé, Eric, to the party, where it turns out that Ursula has only met him two weeks ago. She has also been lying to him about virtually everything: she told him that she's a teacher, that they were both in Peace Corps, that she built houses in Uruguay and that she is a member of a church, none of which are true. When Phoebe can't stand Ursula's lying to Eric any longer, she tells him everything about her, leading to them breaking up.

Rachel is trying to be good with children by handing out candy to trick-or-treaters, but she fails already with the first one by boring them with a story about fashion. The second one doesn't go any better: when a girl says "I love you" to Rachel, she dumps all the candy in her bowl. She then starts giving out money, which she also runs out of pretty soon. For the next people she writes checks, but when Gunther brings candy again, the other kids also want to have money. When Rachel doesn't give money anymore, she ends up in a fight with a boy, ends up giving him 50 dollars to make him stop crying, and also has to pose as his girlfriend for several houses. On her return, she confesses to Joey that she isn't entirely cut out for motherhood yet.

Monica and Phoebe, dressed as Catwoman and Supergirl respectively, argue about who would win in a fight: Chandler or Ross. They think Ross, but Chandler wants to prove them that they're wrong. To settle this, Ross and Chandler have an arm-wrestling match that goes on forever, as they are, according to Joey, both "equally weak". When Mona is looking and talking to Joey, it's starting to look really bad for Ross, so he asks Chandler to let him win. Chandler agrees, but Monica doesn't believe him when he tells her. He challenges her to an arm-wrestling match to prove it, but struggles to keep up with her strength while doing so.

Cast and Crew[]

Main Cast[]

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

Supporting Cast[]

Bonnie Somerville - Mona
Sean Penn - Eric
James Michael Tyler - Gunther
Daniel E. Smith - The boy in the cape
Rachel David - The ballerina
Emily Osment - Lelani Mayolanofavich
Ivy Malone - The cowgirl

Crew[]

Directed By:
Gary Halvorson

Written By:
Mark Kunerth

Trivia[]

  • This is the only Halloween episode of the series. However, "The One With Phoebe's Birthday Dinner" takes place on Halloween.
  • Sean Penn was mentioned by Chandler and Eddie in "The One Where Dr. Ramoray Dies" when they discussed the capital of Cambodia.
  • When Phoebe is talking to Ursula on the street, the Dot's Spot restaurant can be seen in the background.
  • Monica says that Chandler's favorite kids book is The Velveteen Rabbit; this was also Kathy's favorite childhood book.
  • This is the last time that Lisa Kudrow portrays Ursula Buffay in the series.
  • This episode is the first episode shot after 9/11. Production was delayed for two weeks, because the table read for this episode was originally scheduled for Tuesday morning September 11th. 
  • Despite the episode's title, the episode actually aired the day after Halloween.
  • Lisa Kudrow has cited this as her favorite episode, also because it was the first one they shot after 9/11 and people would thank her for still making them laugh in that dark period.
  • At the beginning of the episode, Joey is wearing a t-shirt bearing the logo of the Fire Department of New York. This is one of several tributes to the city featured on the show in wake of 9/11, another being the 'I ♥ NY' drawing on the Magna Doodle in "The One With The Videotape".
  • This is a list of the costumes that the Friends group and Gunther wore.
    • Rachel- Wearing a new dress
    • Ross- Spud-nik
    • Joey- Chandler
    • Phoebe- Supergirl
    • Chandler- Pink Rabbit
    • Monica- Catwoman
    • Gunther- Charlie Brown
  • Emily Osment later starred in the Disney Channel series Hannah Montana and the Freeform series, Young & Hungry.
  • In the uncut DVD episode, Joey tells Mona "you came as a slutty nurse" to which she replies "no I'm actually a nurse". Also in the uncut DVD episode, Monica turns to Phoebe and says "Chandler is doing his sex face". This is also seen in some TV versions.
  • Matthew Perry proposed as the episode's tag having him tell Sean Penn that he was considering more dramatic roles, only for Penn to look at his bunny suit and say "good luck with that". The producers gave a veto as the show never broke the fourth wall.

Goofs[]

  • When Mona enters the apartment, Rachel looks at her and the line "Hey Mona" is heard, but Rachel's mouth does not match this line. 

Continuity[]

  • This episode shows that Ross and Chandler are equally strong (or equally weak, according to Joey). However, in "The One With The Tiny T-Shirt", Ross seems to be much stronger, carrying Chandler who is trying to stop him and dragging the Foosball table at the same time while Chandler screams in shock "You are surprisingly strong!".
    • Additionally, in this episode Monica thinks that Ross would win in a fight with Chandler. But in "The One With Monica And Chandler's Wedding", she laughs at the idea of Ross beating Chandler up. It is possible he has worked out since then. In "The One With The Videotape", Ross says he has been working out, at least since a month before the wedding.
  • When Rachel found out she was pregnant during Monica and Chandler's wedding, she was 4 weeks along. Since Halloween occurs at the end of October and their wedding was on May 15th, that would make Rachel almost 6 months pregnant. Her stomach is not big enough in this episode for her to be so far along. However if she became pregnant 4 weeks before this season's premiere,  then her stomach is about right as Ross stated Rachel was two months pregnant in the previous episode. It would also fit in with Emma's birth in May.  
  • Ursula says to Eric, "Shall we get me really drunk?" In "The One With Two Parts" (Part 2) we learn that Ursula doesn't drink. Although it is possible that she has picked up the habit somewhere in the previous 7 years. Or she was lying then, which this episode shows is something she does frequently.
  • Throughout the episode, Chandler's bunny suit has a widows peak in some moments and not in others.
  • During the scene where Rachel is writing a check to the girl at the door, Mona comes to the door and walks in. Rachel's mouths a drawn out "Hi" but the audio plays "Hi Mona," likely from a voice over added later.

Photos[]


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 Rachel's Date"
Season Eight Episodes Followed by
"The One With The Stain"
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