Courteney Cox Arquette

When your dog, bird, or water-dwelling mammal disappears, who do you call? Ace Ventura (Jim Carrey) is a low-rent private eye who specializes in recovering lost animals, so when Snowflake, the Miami Dolphins' aquatic mascot, is kidnapped, team representative Melissa Robinson (Courtney Cox) puts Ace on the case. However, Snowflake isn't the only Miami Dolphin who has gone missing; several key members of the team also disappear, including quarterback Dan Marino (who plays himself), who is spirited away while filming a TV commercial. With the Super Bowl only two weeks away, will Ace be able to find Snowflake and the missing athletes in time to salvage the big game? Ace Ventura: Pet Detective was a surprise box office smash and catapulted manic comedian Jim Carrey to stardom. The supporting cast includes Sean Young as ill-tempered Lois Einhorn, Udo Kier as the sinister Ronald Camp, and rapper Tone Loc as Ace's detective pal Emilio (Loc also wrote and performed a song for the closing credits). ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Who'd have thought that we'd ever watch Debbie Reynolds and Suzanne Pleshette playing grandmothers? Yet, grannies they are-and very glamorous ones-in the made-for-TV Battling for Baby. A pre-Friends Courteney Cox plays a young mother who decides to go back to work to help pay the bills. Cox's mother, Pleshette and her mother-in-law Reynolds battle over who will have the honor of looking after the baby while the new mom is away. A few "very special" dramatic scenes aside, this is essentially harmless froth, in the tradition of 1950s TV sitcoms. Battling for Baby originally aired January 12, 1992. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Long before she was in Friends, Courteney Cox had to deal with a few enemies in Blue Desert. A rape victim, Cox is given the runaround by the New York police. Fed up with city life, she heads for the wide open spaces of Arizona. Not long afterward, she is propositioned by lowlife Craig Sheffer. She reports this to sympathetic local cop D.B. Sweeney, who replies matter-of-factly that this is not the first time that Sheffer has been accused of a sexual offense. To her amazement, Cox is later visited by Sheffer, who agitatedly warns her not to trust the supposedly sweet-natured Sweeney. Someone is lying about something-and Cox plain doesn't know who to believe. When she finally finds out, it's nearly too late. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this dark comedy, Seth Warner (Aidan Quinn) is a good man having a run of bad luck. His pregnant wife disappeared in the ocean during a trip to the beach, a tornado destroyed his house while leaving everything else in the neighborhood untouched, his boss fired him, and he was struck by a bolt of lightning that also injured his dog. While recovering in the hospital, Seth comes to the conclusion that God has cursed him. His brother-in-law Harry (Anthony LaPaglia) thinks that this conclusion is absurd -- after all, Harry reasons, he violates five or six commandments every day before lunch, and things are just great with him. This notion puts a bug in Seth's ear, and when he gets out of the hospital, he decides to confront God by deliberately violating all ten commandments; he hopes to start by seducing Harry's wife, Rachel (Courteney Cox). ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Gangly, redheaded British comedian Daisy Donovan, who skyrocketed to fame with her satirical news reports and interviews on her own country's The 11 O'Clock Show, was the star of this American quasi-reality series. In each episode, Donovan popped up in a different corner of the United States, in search of eccentric locals and regional curiosities. The premise was that Daisy was soaking up research in her quest to become "The All American Girl." Co-produced by actors David Arquette and Courteney Cox Arquette, the series was given the go-ahead for nine half-hour trial episodes when it was optioned by the TBS Superstation. Daisy Does America was okayed for a weekly TBS slot beginning in December 2005. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this well-wrought, fast-paced caper flick, a naive, good-hearted waitress doesn't think twice about helping her troubled roommate. Unfortunately, her help lands her in Central America fleeing for her life with a grungy mercenary. They are chased because the two are believed to have possession of a priceless religious icon. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The first season of Friends could easily have been retitled "Getting to Know You," as all the soon-to-be-familiar characters, and their equally soon-to-be familiar interrelationships, were swiftly and economically established. In the opening episode, Rachel Green (Jennifer Aniston) abandons her "Mr. Potato Head" spouse at the altar and moves in with her former high-school friend Monica Geller (Courteney Cox) in Monica's spacious New York loft apartment. Not long afterward, we meet Monica's brother, Ross (David Schwimmer), who is down in the dumps because his ex-wife, Carol (Jane Sibbett), has not only declared herself a lesbian, but will soon be giving birth to his son (named Ben), whom she and her partner intend to raise without any of Ross' help. Also, we are treated to the first of aspiring actor Joey Tribbiani's (Matt LeBlanc) dead-end "big breaks" when he is hired as Al Pacino's stand-in. Finally, airhead Phoebe Buffay (Lisa Kudrow) is given the opportunity to perform her treacly folk songs at the gang's favorite hangout, the Central Perk coffeehouse -- only to have her debut spoiled by a citywide power blackout. In other developments, Ross "adopts" a monkey named Marcel; Joey briefly falls for Phoebe's bitchy twin sister, Ursula (also played by Lisa Kudrow); and Joey's roommate, Chandler Bing (Matthew Perry), betrays a confidence by informing Rachel that Ross has a crush on her. A solid hit from the moment it left the starting gate, Friends wound up its freshman season as the eighth highest-rated program on American television. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

As Friends enters its third season, the series' romantic intrigues intensify. Monica (Courteney Cox) breaks up with Dr. Richard Burke (played during season two by Tom Selleck); Chandler (Matthew Perry) gets serious with his new girlfriend, Janice (Maggie Wheeler), but she can't bear to part with her former husband; and the relationship between Rachel (Jennifer Aniston) and Ross (David Schwimmer) abruptly ends. And so it goes right up to the final episode of the season, in which, during a day at the beach, Ross and Rachel realize that they're still in love, Chandler begins mulling over the option of dating Monica, and Phoebe (Lisa Kudrow) learns a shocking fact about her long-lost parents. Evidently, the viewers of America couldn't get enough of these plot entanglements; Friends closed out its third season as the fourth highest-rated program on network television. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Season five of Friends opens just a few moments after the wedding of Ross (David Schwimmer) and Emily (Helen Baxendale), in which Ross all but sealed the doom for the union by invoking the name of Rachel (Jennifer Aniston) during the exchange of vows. It is also a scant few hours after Chandler (Matthew Perry) and Monica (Courteney Cox) have slept together for the first time. The latter couple tries to keep their romance a secret, but by mid-season everyone knows the truth. In later plot developments, the newly divorced Ross briefly moves in with Chandler and Joey; and surrogate mother Phoebe (Lisa Kudrow) gives birth to triplets. In the now-famous season-five finale, Joey heads to Las Vegas for a juicy film role, and is eventually joined by the rest of his friends. Caught up in the glamour and glitter of Sin City, Monica and Chandler briefly consider a quickie Vegas marriage...only to find out that two of the other "friends" have beaten them to it! Friends wrapped up its fifth season on the air as the second most popular network program in America -- not to mention its post-Seinfeld status as the country's top-rated sitcom. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The twentysomething characters of Friends have all officially entered their thirties as the series itself enters its seventh season. Likewise "official," at long last, is the engagement of Monica (Courteney Cox) and Chandler (Matthew Perry), with Joey (Matt LeBlanc) agreeing to serve as best man at the wedding, and Rachel (Jennifer Aniston) and Phoebe (Lisa Kudrow) accepting the invitation to be maids of honor. In fact, there's good news all around during season seven: Ross begins to bond with his son, Ben (Cole Sprouse), whose mother, Carol (Jane Sibbett), had divorced Ross when she came out as a lesbian; and struggling actor Joey returns to the role of "Dr. Drake Ramoray" on the daytime drama Days of Our Lives. Originally killed off by the writers, Dr. Ramoray is revealed to have been in a coma, and when he awakes, the brain of a woman has been transplanted into his skull -- but what the heck, a job is a job! Predictably, the season ends with the big wedding, and with a few "minor" complications, notably Chandler's disappearance the night before the ceremony, and Rachel and Phoebe's discovery that one of the women in the cast is pregnant -- but who? While Friends remained the top-rated sitcom in America, in the overall numbers it ranked in fifth place, following the reality series Survivor, the medical drama ER, and the twice-weekly game show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide