Murder She Wrote Parodied The Hit '90s Sitcom That Helped Cancel The Mystery Drama

In its final season, the beloved mystery series "Murder, She Wrote" aired an episode spoofing "Friends." The hit NBC sitcom was a valid target for the Angela Lansbury-led show, too, as "Friends" had played a major part in "Murder, She Wrote" getting canceled.

For its first eleven seasons, "Murder, She Wrote" aired on CBS on Sunday nights after "60 Minutes," where it had enjoyed record-setting ratings. For the twelfth season, however, the network decided to move the show to the buzzier Thursday night time slot, where it would be airing opposite the sophomore season of "Friends."The 16th episode of "Murder, She Wrote" Season 12 cheekily referenced the resulting showdown. Titled "Murder Among Friends," it centered on a producer of a sitcom — one that's very much like "Friends" — who is murdered right before he announces which member of the cast he's killing off.

The gambit to make the show a hit with the younger audience failed miserably, presumably because the sought-after younger audience was watching "Friends." "Murder, She Wrote" went from a regular fixture of Nielsen's Top 20 to 67th place. "When they told me, I said, 'How can you do this to us?'" Lansbury recalled in an interview with The Television Academy. "How can you put us into a totally non-win situation? We cannot possibly survive on Thursday night opposite 'Friends.'" And they didn't. CBS moved the show back to Sunday night for the final four episodes, but the damage was done — and the reign of one of the best detective shows ever made was over.

In an interview with The Washington Post, Angela Lansbury rejected suggestions that "Murder, She Wrote" had an exclusively elderly audience — or that the series had become too expensive for CBS to continue making. She was also clearly hurt by the cancellation, to the point where she could barely talk about how upset she was in a 1996 appearance on "60 Minutes."

"Murder, She Wrote" at least went out swinging, in its own sassy way. The series finale, which aired on May 19, 1996, was titled "Death By Demographics." In that episode, a San Francisco radio station shock jock is killed following the station's switch from playing classical music to rock. "You realize we're going to lose our entire audience," the concerned son of the station owner protests. "Yes, and replace it with 12-to-18-year-olds," the producer behind the change replies. "The ones who spend serious money on new products and new ideas, and the ones that advertisers pay big bucks to reach."

Sounds awfully familiar.