History Series / LesFillesDaCote

* SocialSemiCircle: [[TheCouch The sofa]] is the indispensible prop in the girls' apartment. The three girls and others are often seen interacting or having in-depth conversation while sitting on the sofa, with the camera angle directly in front and shot from a suspiciously low angle. Of course, this is also an aspect of MsFanservice, as TheNineties fashions tended towards short skirts and bare legs. The occasional panty shot was not edited out of the final show. [[SarcasmMode One wonders why this was not spotted in editing]]. Discussions in the boys' apartment tended to be around the dining table and shot from a higher angle - but also stuck to this principle.

* SocialSemiCircle: [[TheCouch The sofa]] is the indispensible prop in the girls' apartment. The three girls and others are often seen interacting or having in-depth conversation while sitting on the sofa, with the camera angle directly in front and shot from a suspiciously low angle. Of course, this is also an aspect of MsFanservice, as TheNineties fashions tended towards short skirts and bare legs. The occassional PantyShot was not edited out of the final show. [[SarcasmMode One wonders why this was not spotted in editing]]. Discussions in the boys' apartment tended to be around the dining table and shot from a higher angle - but also stuck to this principle.

* TheNineties: the show is an advert for everything thought chic or fashionable or stylish in France in the 1990s. Even though it looks vaguely dated today, the show and the people in it are still easy on the eye.

* TheOddCouple: Daniel and Marc. He's tidy, well-presented, mature, debonair, sophisticated... and then there's Marc.

* ButtMonkey: Marc, whose immature and strident personality combined with CasanovaWannabe leads to frequent humiliation. Two Butt Monkeys collide when he interacts with Georgette, who is also Ground Zero for all the standard FatGirl jokes. Georgette's pursuit of Marc is played heavily for laughs.

* FatGirl: Georgette Bellefeuille, the only regular cast member who does not fit the desired image of young and beautiful.

The show followed a tried and trusted TV sitcom formula, following the lives of two groups of unattached thirtysomethings who rent neighbouring apartments in a communal shared block. Daniel and Marc are already flat-sharing; they get as neighbours three old friends, all divorcées or separated from partners, who have decided to pool their resources and share a place together. The three "girls" (all are in their middle thirties) duly move in next door. They introduce themselves as Fanny, Magalie and Claire. HilarityEnsues. [[AbhorrentAdmirer Marc]] is immediately smitten and can't decide which of the three girls he wants to pursue (he finally settles on Magalie, who wants nothing to do with him). Meanwhile the girls (ignoring or avoiding Marc) are all taken with the debonair and sophisticated American photographer Daniel. Who politely turns down their interest as he has a [[GirlfriendInCanada girlfriend]] elsewhere. And downstairs in the basement is a gym and health club for which all residents are automatically members. A key person here is Gérard, who practically runs the place. A likeable CampGay, he becomes a sort of best friend and confidant to the girls. Secondary characters include Vincent (brattish teenage son of Claire) and Wendy (precocious six-year-old daughter of Fanny). And upstairs there is Georgette, who is in love with Marc.

* PutOnABusToHell: The vindictive way Magalie was written out of the show after her actress walked out on the series. To explain her dissappearance she is portrayed as an skeak thief with personality issues who robs the gym and goes on the run.

* TechnologyMarchesOn: A big pointer to this show dating from the middle 1990's is the unbelievably massive size of the mobile phones used by the characters. Fanny is seen to reach intro her bag and bring out a massive brick with an extending aerial, reminiscent of a UsefulNotes/WorldWarII walkie-talkie. If nothing else reminds you this is 1994-95... this does.

* ExpositoryThemeTune:
** An InstrumentalThemeTune that also acts as an {{Infodump}}, explaining with captions and brief extracts from the show who the characters are. It's the sort of jaunty horn-driven piece that tells you you are about to watch a sitcom.
** It is reworked and upgraded into something less horrible and more musically competent for the sucessor series ''Les Nouvelles Filles d'à Côté''

** An InstrumentalThemeTune that also acts as an {{Infodump}}, explaining with captions and brief extracts from the show who the characters are. It is also a a jaunty little EarWorm, the sort of jaunty horn-driven piece that tells you you are about to watch a sitcom, which once stuck in the head is impossible to remove.

* AbsenteeActor: The heavy and unrelenting production schedule - 170 episodes were made and broadcast in a ''fifteen month'' period - took its toll on the actors. Hélène Le Moignic (Magalie) couldn't stand it any more; after 135 episodes and [[HostilityOnTheSet acrimonious backstage rows]] with Cécile Auclert (Fanny) she simply quit and walked out. A sucession of newcomers were trialled to replace her and notoriously autocratic producer [[ControlFreak Jean-Luc Azoulay]] took revenge by having it written in to the series that in a moment of madness Magalie had robbed the safe at the gym - ''and'' had an affair with the execrable Marc. The character had then fled to South America, overcome with shame over both misdemeanours.

* ButtMonkey: Marc, whose immature and strident personality combined with KavorkaMan leads to frequent humiliation. Two Butt Monkeys collide when he interacts with Georgette, who is also Ground Zero for all the standard FatGirl jokes. Georgette's pursuit of Marc is played heavily for laughs.

* ExpositoryThemeTune: an InstrumentalThemeTune that also acts as an {{Infodump}}, explaining with captions and brief extracts from the show who the characters are. It is also a a jaunty little EarWorm, the sort of jaunty horn-driven piece that tells you you are about to watch a sitcom, which once stuck in the head is impossible to remove.

* MsFanservice: Shamelessly played. Right from the opening credits where the girls smile and wave at the camera while in bathing costumes. The gym setting allows many further opportunities for the girls to wear skimpy workout clothing; and none of the troop of extras in the background are less than averagely good-looking either. One episode has the girls in lingerie.

* The OddCouple: Daniel and Marc. He's tidy, well-presented, mature, debonair, sophisticated... and then there's Marc.

** In the reboot show ''Les Nouvelles Filles d'à Côté'', full-body massages are introduced in the Health Club and sure enough, there is at least one [[NippledAndDimed brief moment of toplessness]] involving one of the second-generation Girls Next Door.

!!Des tropes qui suintent de cette sitcom comme du Brie réchauffé :

* TechnologyMarchesOn: A big pointer to this show dating from the middle 1990's is the unbelievably massive size of the mobile phones used by the characters. Fanny is seen to reach intro her bag and bring out a massive brick with an extending aerial, reminiscent of a WW2 walkie-talkie. If nothing else reminds you this is 1994-95... this does.

* FrenchJerk: Marc. Even Daniel acknowledges his friend has socially undesirable qualities. There is his freeloading, and the fact that while he is pursuing Magalie, he isn't above chasing Fanny and Claire ''as well''. During an electricity blackout, he "accidentally" grabs Fanny in the dark, for instance. To be the French Jerk in a French TV show, acclaimed as such by other French people, has to be taking it UpToEleven.

** Evidence exists that this is not accidental or merely playing to a trope for comic effect: [[http://sitcomologie.net/2016/04/29/le-diktat-de-la-minceur-chez-ab-productions/ a critical analysis]] quoting Dan Smkovich (Georgette) and Charly Chemouney (Charly) describes the "culture of thin-ness" in AB Productions and describes the agressive way in which fat people were portrayed in AB's output as perverse, diseased and something to be shunned, to be treated as a sort of social leper.

* TransatlanticEquivalent: It's tempting to see this as a French copy of ''Series/{{Friends}}'' with less stellar scripts. Fanny = Phoebe; Magalie = Monica; Claire = Rachel.

* SocialSemiCircle: The sofa is the indispensible prop in the girls' apartment. The three girls and others are often seen interacting or having in-depth conversation while sitting on the sofa, with the camera angle directly in front and shot from a suspiciously low angle. Of course, this is also an aspect of MsFanservice, as TheNineties fashions tended towards short skirts and bare legs. The occassional PantyShot was not edited out of the final show. [[SarcasmMode One wonders why this was not spotted in editing]]. Discussions in the boys' apartment tended to be around the dining table and shot from a higher angle - but also stuck to this principle.

* CopiouslyCreditedCreator: Jean-Luc Azoulay liked to be heavily credited for his shows, generally under his alias of Jean-François Porry. Apparently, among other achievements, he wrote all 326 scripts for every episode.

* CopiouslycreditedCreator: Jean-Luc Azoulay liked to be heavily credited for his shows, generally under his alias of Jean-François Porry. Apparently, among other achievements, he wrote all 326 scripts for every episode.

* BottleEpisode: More of a bottle ''series''. Only four sets are used -- all of them indoors. The fact there is an entire country called France out there is another InformedAttribute.

* BottleEpisode: More of a bottle ''series''. Only four sets are used -- all of them indoors. The fact there is an entire country called France out there is another InformedAttribute.

* AbhorrentAdmirer: Marc to Magalie; Marc to ''any'' of the girls; Georgette to Marc.