When ‘Friends’ Killed Off ‘Murder, She Wrote’
Television in the 1990s would be a decade that revolutionized sitcoms and dramas. The Simpsons spoofed a typical family comedy, while Twin Peaks descended a soap opera into dark surrealism. Never was that more clear than when a long-running mystery show confronted this new reality with an emerging sitcom. Murder, She Wrote ran from 1984 to 1996, and a major reason it ended was because of the growing popularity of Friends. The cozy mystery formula wasn’t enough anymore. Although the sitcom didn’t set out to end it, by the following year, only one of these shows was left standing.
‘Murder, She Wrote’ Once Had a ‘Friends’ Rip-off
Jessica Fletcher (Angela Lansbury) is a successful mystery writer and amateur detective. Each episode sees her traveling or going about her day in her New England town, always investigating and solving if not one murder, several. In Season 12’s “Murder Among Friends,” there’s a hot new show on TV. While Jessica is trying to keep her PBS program going strong, teaching how Alfred Hitchcock made his thrillers work, all the studio attention is going to Buds, a comedy that is centered around a friend group of 20-somethings. Soon, the domineering creator is killed and Jessica learns everyone had a good enough motive to do the crime. It won’t take you long to see how much of Buds is a rip-off of Friends. Any similarities to characters or episode events are usually purely coincidental — except when it comes to this.
The Cozy Mystery Series Suffered a Steep Decline in Viewership
A May 1996 article, the Los Angeles Times stated, “The highest-rated drama series for nine consecutive seasons, ‘Murder’ saw its ranking plunge this year from No. 9 to No. 65.” David Shaw, co-producer on MSW, explained how CBS once gave Lansbury a good amount of control over the coveted Sunday 8 p.m. slot, for MSW and potentially another show she starred in afterward. Factors changed by the time Season 12 was made; there were new people in charge of CBS, plus a decline in ratings for the channel as a whole. In an attempt to ease conflicts, CBS did move MSW back to Sunday nights for its culminating four episodes, but Lansbury had been frustrated. Maddy Horn, head of programming at CBS, talked about the overall decision, saying, “That was to establish a comedy block on Sunday and also to strengthen Thursday night [with] the only viable alternative to the NBC comedies. We actually accomplished both.” It sounds more positive than what happened though. This was 1995-1996 and what didn’t help was the nostalgic, coziness to Murder, She Wrote, a polar opposite of the younger, livelier Friends.
The One Where ‘Murder, She Wrote’ Said Goodbye
Talking about the night slot switch-up, Lansbury said in The Spokesman-Review, “I don’t think I would have ever agreed to do this 12th season if I knew this was going to happen. I just couldn’t understand. I couldn’t find any logic to their thinking, and neither could anybody else.” Murder, She Wrote, as Lansbury described, was “family-oriented,” and in talking about the show’s fans, she said, “They are all fascinated by this older woman who has it all together and solves these naughty little problems. Nobody ever thinks of Jessica as being a bloodthirsty woman who enjoys the gore and the horror of the murder. The murder is incidental. It sets the stage to solve the crime.” Friends offered a different approach to entertainment, by looking into the daily lives of characters who, unlike Jessica, didn’t have it all figured out or could end an episode with a tidy bow and freeze-frame.
Murder, She Wrote had become a family affair for Lansbury, who was an executive producer, with her husband Peter Shaw as a producer and her son David Shaw as a co-producer. It would also bring in older actors for guest spots, like Cesar Romero, Roddy McDowall, and even Tom Selleck, who did a Magnum, P.I. crossover. Courteney Cox also guest-starred, in a very small role, for Season 3.
