Barátok közt

Barátok közt (in English: Among Friends) was a Hungarian television soap opera aired on RTL Klub. Its premiere was on 26 October 1998 and its finale was on 17 July 2021.

Through its entire run, it had been screened as two episodes on every weekday. Since its premiere, Barátok közt was the most watched regular programme domestically in Hungary, with around 1.2 million viewers per night.

On 30 November 2020, in the wake of declining ratings, RTL Klub announced that the winter 2021 season would be the final season, bringing to an end the soap after 23 seasons and more than 10 000 episodes. The soap ended with a grand finale which aired in prime time, instead of its usual early evening slot, and ran for 40 minutes.

Synopsis
The series takes place on the fictional Mátyás király tér (King Matthias Square) in Budapest. Barátok közt is about the life of the people living here, about the Berényi family and their family business. In the first episode the oldest one of the Berényi brothers, Zoltán Berényi dies and leaves his company to his wife, Claudia Berényi, his two brothers, Miklós and András Berényi (died in 2013), Miklós’ wife, Nóra Balogh (divorced in 2005), and his friend, László Novák.

Most of the characters are well known in Hungary, like Zsolt Bartha, or Magdolna Kertész, whose death in 2009 was among the greatest news in the country.