Friends is one of those shows that pays close attention to each of the life areas of its main characters: hobbies, family, romance, and careers. From their mid-twenties to their mid-thirties, Joey, Rachel, Ross, Phoebe, Monica, and Chandler still have a lot to figure out. Throughout the ten seasons of the show, they have good and bad years, but eventually, they all end on a happy note with the jobs they always wanted.From Monica’s rocky yet successful career in the food industry to Joey finally making it as an actor, all the main characters in Friends get amazing jobs in the end. Even Rachel, who started at a disadvantage, eventually discovered her true passion and found the stability and independence she was looking for when she cut ties with her family.
Joey Goes Through a Lot of Jobs Before Officially Becoming an ActorEven though Joey was in his mid-twenties at the beginning of Friends, he spent a great deal of time during Friends unemployed. In fact, it appears that Chandler pays for most of his bills. However, Joey invests most of his efforts in furthering his acting career. He goes to several auditions, plays a part in small roles or commercials, and eventually even lands a leading role as Dr. Drake Ramoray in the soap opera Days of Our Lives. When he angers the writers, he’s killed off from the series but returns a couple of seasons later, in a dramatic twist involving a brain transplant on his character. Joey’s career is full of highs and lows, but in the end, he manages to keep a steady job on this soap opera until the end of the series.Joey’s Jobs in Friends
Season(s)
Santa Claus 1
Selling cologne 2
Dr. Drake Ramoray in Days of Our Lives 2, 7-10
Selling Christmas trees 3
Tour Guide at the Museum of Natural History 4
Before getting his breakout role as Dr. Drake Ramoray, however, Joey had to do many temporary jobs. Like Rachel, he worked as a waiter in Central Perk. He also tried to become a film writer, donated his sperm, sold Christmas trees, dressed as Santa Claus, became a tour guide for the Museum of Natural History (thanks to Ross), and sold cologne in a department store. Joey also had some minor acting roles, such as Al Pacino’s butt double, a corpse in Law and Order, and Mac Machiavelli in the comedy show Mac and C.H.E.E.S.E, where his coworker is a robot.
Monica Always Wanted to Become a Head Chef in a Fancy Restaurant
Monica had several jobs through Friends, but all of them were related to her true vocation, cooking. Monica decided to become a chef when Chandler told her he loved her Mac and Cheese when she was only in high school and had a crush on the older boy. She went to culinary school, and from then on, pursued a career in this area. At the beginning of the series, Monica works as a sous-chef in a restaurant called Iridium, where she also meets Paul “the wine guy.” In the second season, Monica receives a promotion but gets fired after accepting gifts from one of her food providers.
Monica’s Jobs in Friends
Season(s)
Sous-chef in a regular restaurant 1, 2
Waitress 2, 3
Food critic and caterer 4
Head Chef at Alessandro’s 4-9
Head Chef at an upscale restaurant 9, 10
This triggers a complicated time in Monica’s life. She works in several low-paid jobs, such as creating recipes for a company that sells food substitutes, as a waiter at the Moondance Diner (where she shamefully has to wear a costume and skates), and even creates her own catering company with Phoebe. Eventually, she gets hired as the head chef at Alessandro’s after she writes the restaurant a negative review. Monica finally lands her dream job in the ninth season, working as the head chef of Javu, a high-profile restaurant in Manhattan.
Ross Has a Long-Standing Career Studying Dinosaurs
By the time Friends begins, with Rachel’s arrival in the group, Ross is the one with the most stable and consolidated career — which he never gets tired of bragging about. Ross has a Ph.D. in paleontology and worked as a paleontologist at the New York Museum of Prehistoric History. There’s nothing Ross loves more than dinosaurs, and he’s pretty proud of his job. At one point, he even has a hard time deciding between dinosaurs and sex, so this job is right up his alley.
Paleontologist
Paleontology professor
After he takes a mandatory sabbatical from the museum, Ross finds a job as a paleontology professor at New York University. Throughout the series, he publishes several essays on his field, and he’s invited as a speaker at some conferences. Eventually, he also receives tenure at NYU, and the show ends with Ross as an academic. Ross’s job has been criticized by people who work as academics because they think it’s a detail in Friends that doesn’t make sense, since Ross doesn’t spend nearly as much time reading, writing, and working as people in his field usually do.
Phoebe Works as a Masseuse, and She Has Plenty of Hobbies
Phoebe’s main occupation in Friends is massage therapist, and she keeps it up for the entire series. At some point, her brother thinks “masseuse” is a code for a more spicy profession, but Phoebe is just a regular masseuse. In the 9th season, Phoebe reveals she got a job in a fancy spa, which gets her amazing benefits, despite her usual dislike of big corporations. This shows that Phoebe changes throughout the show, and starts to choose a comfortable life for herself.
Phoebe also comments that she spent a lot of time robbing people on the streets of New York. She even robbed Ross before she met him.However, while massage therapy pays her bills, Phoebe also has many hobbies, especially music. She spends a lot of her free time singing for people in Central Perk, and she also likes to compose and write songs. While she’s not particularly talented — which is part of the joke — she does manage to sell her iconic song “Smelly Cat” for a commercial and an official video. Likewise, Phoebe has many other talents, like speaking French, and she also has a broad spiritual life. At some point, she also worked with Monica in a catering company.
Rachel Goes From Waitress to a High-Profile Job in the Fashion IndustryRachel was born rich, and she was planning to live the life of a “trophy wife.” However, when she leaves Barry at the altar and cuts all ties with her family, she has to make a living on her own. With no college education and no skills, Rachel worked as a waitress in Central Perk for three years. She was a lousy waitress, but Gunther let it slide because he had a crush on her. Later on, she discovers that she can build a career based on her advanced knowledge of fashion.First, Rachel works as an assistant for Fortunata Fashions. The job isn’t amazing, as it still consists of a lot of making coffee for her boss, but at least it puts her in her line of interest. Fortunately, this job doesn’t last long as she meets Mark, who gets her an interview at Bloomingdale’s, where she is hired as an assistant buyer under the supervision of her tyrannical boss, Joanna. While she’s demoted from this job because her department closes, she soon finds another, better job as a women’s wear coordinator at Ralph Lauren. This job gives her the experience to pursue even more interesting venues, such as Gucci and Louis Vuitton. Rachel is actually hired by Louis Vuitton in Paris, but she gives up the job to stay in New York with Ross.
