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Friends move out for Will & Grace

TEN replaces one 1990s sitcom with another from next Monday.

TEN has now sent through details of its plans to replace Friends with Will and Grace from 7pm next Monday.

It will begin with Series Two, episode one “Guess Who’s Not Coming to Dinner.”

Formerly a Seven Network sitcom, and currently airing on Pay TV, this is the first time the comedy will air on TEN.

The comedy starring Eric McCormack, Debra Messing, Sean Hayes and Megan Mullally ran from 1998 – 2006. As a “millennial Odd Couple” it began as something of a response to the political and social climate of Clinton’s ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ policy. While Will was open with his sexuality, many noted he was unable to sustain a relationship for many years while barely managing as much as a smooch. That helped win over viewers, who were still coming to terms with Ellen’s outing.

But the show clearly connected with audiences on a purely comic level and was one of several “classic” studio / multicam sitcoms that ended in the mid 2000’s (apologies to Charlie Sheen).

Of particular note was the fact that ever single episode was directed by James Burrows.

It airs on TEN from 7pm Monday Oct 27.

50 Responses

  1. Ten seems to be promoting this as much as possible…the daily promos for Neighbours now show…
    “6:30 Neighbours
    7:00 Will & Grace”
    …at the end. Don’t remember them doing that for Taken Out.

    And those 3 second teaser ads were still airing tonight.

  2. Will & Grace is easily the most funniest show of all time so I hope it rates really well.
    Weird that they’re starting at Season 2 though. It’s only the first couple of episodes of Season 1 that aren’t up to par with the rest of them though, not the entire season like some of you are saying. Guess it took them a few episodes to find their mojo 🙂

    W & G is much more funnier than Friends as well. I do like Friends, but I find it’s humor is a bit dumbed-down and aimed more towards a less-smart audience whereas W & G is very cleverly written and is a lot smarter!!

  3. “Why not bring back Full House, Home Improvement, Malcolm in the Middle, Frasier, Married with Children??”

    well, some of those shows were actually funny, so networks can’t understand their moonspeak.

  4. I think this is brilliant idea seeing as Seven never really gave it a proper run the first time through. My only concern is that it’ll be unnecessarily edited for 7pm. It was frustrating to watch Friends episodes only to hear the laughter track come in out of nowhere, an obvious sign that something had been cut out. I know Seasons 3-8 of the WAG DVDs are PG rated, and Home and Away is rated PG so it should be fine.

    Bit disappointed they didn’t start from season one, some of Karen and Jack’s best moments were when they first met each other for the first time. I wanna see them touch stomachs!

  5. Ugh, another corny American sitcom. If they want a good sitcom then why don’t they buy Cheers from 9? God knows they’re never going to show that again. It went for eleven seasons so it’ll take a while to get through.

  6. Andrew, BB was crap and nobody was watching it, thats why it got axed and please, W&G sexual inneundo, the humour is often camp in W&G but the woeful 2.5 men has way more sexual references & Innuendo than W&G does..but thats straight innuendo, so that must be ok..geez…”Are you being served” was rife with innuendo 35 years ago and id didnt get dragged off the air..lighten up buddy.

  7. I was a late coming to W&G I think i started with S3 or 4 have to say the 1st handful of episodes of S1 were very average if I HAD started watching it from the start I would of given up by the 3rd episode

  8. @Andrew
    I have never watched Will and Grace(have seen both versions of Coupling,however). Ch.10, even if they had the rights for the British version of Coupling, WOULD’N’T air it at 7pm.

  9. Andrew, they didn’t have any memorable when it aired before from memory. W&G is more romantic rather than sexual innuendo. 2.5 Men has more if you ask me!

    They had issues with The L Word and Californication, amongst others.

  10. Oh I forgot to add, they could play the ELLEN show too. That was a great show back in the day, I’m sure people would want to watch a well scripted comedy show regardless if it was years old, the FTA channels never over killed it like 2.5 men and foxtel used to play it but doesn’t anymore. They wont know unless they try considering Ellen is becoming more popular than Oprah now.

  11. Karen is the annoying short women with the voice.. and IMO she makes the show.. i love Karen..

    Very excited that TEN has choose to show Will and Grace.. tho im not sure that it will rate as well as Friends as it wasnt as popular.. however maybe that is a reason it might rate more cos many people have missed out on this great series.. i definately plan to re-watch and catch some eps!

    Great move TEN!

  12. That 6pm timeslot is a bit of a black hole, nothing has done as well as the Simspons did. People do want a choice to news news news at 6pm but its just a matter of finding the right alternative.

  13. Smart move Channel 10, Just dont butcher it like Channel 7 did. When it was on 7 it really annoyed and frustrated me. Give it a fair go like u did with friends.

  14. Glad I’m not the only one who finds the short one with the annoying voice (who’s name escapes me at the moment) a turn on. Lol. If they’re gonna keep showing reruns at least they’re showing new reruns.

  15. I have only seen a couple of Will and Grace episodes in the past. The short woman with the annoying voice was a huge turn off for me. But I have been enjoying the Friends reruns on Ten so I guess I will give this a go. I just wish Ten had played the “too “risque for 6pm” Friends episodes at 7pm after playing the finale a few weeks ago.

  16. The Pay TV audience may still tune in for a widescreen broadcast of the show – at least until Harry Connick Jr shows up – then all bets are off – that man is sitcom repellant.

  17. Scott….something original 6pm-7:30pm?….7&9 hardly have anything original…News, Current Affairs (term used loosely) US Sitcom/Aussie “Drama” versus US Animation, Aussie “Drama”, US Sitcom. Obviously original (ie.Taken Out) doesn’t always work. I’m sure Ten’s Programmers would love to hear from you.

    DanR…over-exposure is hardly a problem on TEN…Simpsons, Neighbours, L&O, etc. Todd…with PayTV, why would these audiences watch FTA anyway?

    Friends has been doing worse than Taken Out.

    Christine…re: Biggest Loser: probably, but you’ve got 4 months before that happens

  18. @Andrew,
    This is a BBC show and probably would be only suitable on the ABC(where it has aired previously).
    Also, you couldn’t air it at 7pm, as it is a M rated show full of inuendo and what not…. 10 have previously aired the awful NBC remake of Coupling(thank goodness it was axed).

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