Reception
In its original airing, "The One with Ross's Wedding" finished third in ratings for the week of May 4–10, 1998, with a Nielsen rating of 21.2, equivalent to approximately 20.6 million viewing households. It was the third highest-rated show on NBC that week, following Seinfeld and ER – all of which aired on the network's Thursday night Must See TV lineup. The episode aired in the Republic of Ireland on RTÉ on May 25, 1998, six days earlier than in the United Kingdom on Sky1. It also aired on Channel 4 on December 11, 1998 and was watched by 6.49 million viewers, making Friends the highest rated show on the channel for the week ending December 13, 1998.
Entertainment Weekly gives the episode an A rating, calling it a "near-perfect finale that finds everyone at the top of their game" with a "tantalizing cliff-hanger, and, in Chandler and Monica, a relationship that will have reverberations for seasons to come". The authors of Friends Like Us: The Unofficial Guide to Friends state there are "too many 'best moments' to list in detail", but single out Monica describing the perfect wedding to Ross, and Sarah Ferguson's cameo (though they call Branson's "embarrassing"). Following the broadcast of the episode in the UK, The Independent was critical, saying "Twice the length of a normal episode, last night's offering was approximately half as funny" and suggested the cast were behaving out of character. Many British viewers regarded the episode as an ill-informed and patronising caricature of the UK and its people, causing the episode to be labelled "The One Where They Insult the English".
David Schwimmer has expressed dissatisfaction that Ross was married again, saying it was "a mistake" and that Ross was not given "enough credit". He says that Ross's "taking on the world would just be shattered" following the character's first divorce and that he wouldn't have risked another divorce. David Crane has said that filming in front of a different audience "energized the actors and writers". The hall where the wedding ceremony took place would inspire the location for the wedding of David and Victoria Beckham. The events of this episode are revisited in the seventh season episode "The One with the Truth About London", where flashbacks reveal how Monica and Chandler ended up in bed together. The hotel room set was recreated for those scenes.
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Famous quotes containing the word reception:
“To aim to convert a man by miracles is a profanation of the soul. A true conversion, a true Christ, is now, as always, to be made by the reception of beautiful sentiments.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I gave a speech in Omaha. After the speech I went to a reception elsewhere in town. A sweet old lady came up to me, put her gloved hand in mine, and said, “I hear you spoke here tonight.” “Oh, it was nothing,” I replied modestly. “Yes,” the little old lady nodded, “that’s what I heard.””
—Gerald R. Ford (b. 1913)
“Aesthetic emotion puts man in a state favorable to the reception of erotic emotion.... Art is the accomplice of love. Take love away and there is no longer art.”
—Rémy De Gourmont (1858–1915)