As [ITALIC "Friends"] prepares for its eighth -- and perhaps final -- season, here are a few unsolicited plot suggestions: Marry off pampered Rachel to the hunkiest screen idol alive and throw a wedding in which the groom pledges to "split the difference on the thermostat." Plight finicky Monica's troth to a goofball actor, then send them on a honeymoon tour of roller-coaster parks. Ditzy Phoebe? Have her settle into marriage with a suave Frenchman who dotes on their young son while she pursues a movie career. Once hitched, have the Smug Marrieds hang out over games of dominos, poker and Taboo. [P] How could this stuff miss? Reality shows, after all, are hot, and what could be hotter than the real-life romantic antics of Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox Arquette and Lisa Kudrow? The marriages of Aniston (to Brad Pitt), Cox Arquette (to David Arquette) and Kudrow (to Michel Stern) seem only to have deepened the bonds between the three actresses who first met at auditions for the show in 1994. Not surprisingly, news that [ITALIC "Friends"] might be ending is not going down easily. "It's heartbreaking," Aniston, 32, said last week. "If I think about it, it chokes me up to realize this will be over. It's been a pretty intense eight years for this group of people. Major crossroads in our lives we were at together, so it's very, very sad." (NBC, meanwhile, is still hoping that the actors will sign on for a ninth season. "We would like the show to continue for as long as the cast wants to do it," says NBC Entertainment President Jeff Zucker.) [P] To their credit, as their salaries reportedly have inflated to $750,000 per episode, the female [ITALIC "Friends"] stars (and male stars Matthew Perry, David Schwimmer and Matt LeBlanc as well) have kept their egos in check and their loyalties in line. "No one seems jealous of any of the others," says a source on the set. "The girls are all still friends." They just have less time for each other offscreen, given their respective film and family obligations. "People do grow up," says David Crane, the show's co-creator. "Their lives and priorities shift." [P] [PAGEBREAK] Ah, maturity. Time was when the [ITALIC "Friends"] troika of leading ladies led lives that bore a closer resemblance to their TV personae. Gone are the days when they would wrap a midnight taping at the Warner Bros. Burbank lot, then head to the Smoke House restaurant for beers with LeBlanc, 34, Perry, 32, and Schwimmer, 34. Instead tapings now start three hours earlier, and the stars' husbands often watch from the wings. If the shoot runs late, pizza is brought in for the cast, crew and studio audience. And when it's over, it's over. "They are just as close as ever," says a frequent visitor to the set, "but now it's 'Work's done and it's my weekend and I'm going home to see Brad,' or whatever." [P] Which doesn't mean they don't gather together when they can. Cox Arquette says that during [ITALIC "Friends"]' taping season, they "hang out all the time" and lunch together daily, as has been their habit for seven years. "We try to stay in touch during hiatus and get together," says Kudrow, 38. "But it gets tougher and tougher." Several of Aniston's costars turned out in February for her 32nd-birthday party at the Hollywood Star Lanes, where Pitt secured 10 roped-off lanes for the 40 guests. And when a [ITALIC "Friends"] star recently went to scout a house, she arrived with the other five stars in tow. "It's not just showing up for the big moments," says Morgan Fairchild, who plays Chandler's mother. "It's also helping out in some of those more mundane things where you don't really trust your own judgment." [P] If growing up has meant growing apart, the [ITALIC "Friends"] six-pack have worked hard to accommodate each other's complicated thirtysomething-style lives. All have provided a net of support for Cox Arquette, 37, who suffered a miscarriage this spring ("She was very disappointed," says stepfather Hunter Copeland) and whose 70-year-old father, Richard, is suffering from cancer. They also stood by Perry after his February disappearance into a drug and alcohol rehab center, though there was some strain stemming from whether he would resurface in time for the final season shoot on March 30. (He reemerged March 20 looking tan and healthy.) "It's sort of like a close-knit family, where one child is sick and at the beginning everybody is very sympathetic," says a show staffer. "But after a while, when that child is getting all the attention and everyone's world seems to revolve around his needs, it's very difficult. Remember, these guys have their own lives now: husbands to go home to; Lisa's got her little boy." [P] [PAGEBREAK] [BOLD "Who, by the way"], is more than welcome on what one source calls the "totally kid-friendly" set. Three-year-old Julian regularly attends Friday-night tapings and can always find playmates among the crew's kids in the toy-filled nursery. LeBlanc's fiancee, model Melissa McKnight, 35, often brings her two kids; co-creator Marta Kauffman sometimes arrives with her three. "These days, when Lisa and I sit in the makeup chairs together, we don't talk about what color lipstick we're wearing anymore," says Maggie Wheeler, 42, whose two children play while she shoots scenes as Chandler's ex-girlfriend Janice. "Now we're talking about preschools." The family atmosphere, says Fairchild, "indicates that people have grown not only into their parts, but their lives -- and that there is a real life." [P] Tell that to Pitt and Aniston, who are still relishing their roles as over-the-moon newlyweds. In February, Pitt, 37, told a [ITALIC "Tonight Show"] audience that he and Aniston use computer Webcams to see one another when they're apart. On the Las Vegas set of [ITALIC "Ocean's 11"], Pitt turned up late to a Thursday-night steak dinner with costars George Clooney and Julia Roberts so he could catch his wife on [ITALIC "Friends"]. And in a gesture that produced a resounding gulp in married men everywhere, he famously filled Aniston's [ITALIC "Friends"] dressing room full of roses last Valentine's Day, with the words I Love My Wife spelled out in petals on the wall. [P] "They set a terribly high bar," says John Stockwell, the screenwriter on Aniston's upcoming comedy, [ITALIC "Rock Star"], which opens Sept. 7. "When we see how Brad is around Jen, my wife goes, 'Why can't you be more like Brad?' " For the couple, simply being Brad and Jennifer has required some "adjustments" since their marriage in July 2000, says Aniston. "It was dealing with doing something very intimate and trying to balance that publicly, which you don't necessarily want to do but have no real choice. Family stuff as well." The latter, at least, she was used to: Back in 1999 the whole Pitt clan -- parents Jane, 61, and Bill, 60; siblings Julie, 32, and Doug, 34; their four young children; and grandmother Clara Hillhouse, 91 -- gathered at Pitt's family's home in Springfield, Mo., to give her the once-over. "She did great," says Julie. "She was just so real." And Brad? "There was definitely a huge difference" from the way her brother had behaved toward previous girlfriends. [P] [ITALIC "[BOLD [QUOTE]For the complete version of this story, pick up a copy of PEOPLE, on newsstands now.[QUOTE]]"] [P] -- JILL SMOLOWE[BR]--PAMELA WARRICK, MARK DAGOSTINO, MICHELLE CARUSO, ROBYN FLANS, JULIE JORDAN, ELIZABETH LEONARD, LYNDON STAMBLER and CYNTHIA WANG in Los Angeles