Mad Men

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Mike Kelly
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Re: Mad Men

Post by Mike Kelly »

May your New Year dreams come true
And this song of mine
In three quarter time
Wishes you and yours
The same thing too

They even named the episode after this song, and using Doris Day's 60s version on the jukebox was perfect. The Christmas Waltz also played over the end credits with a different vocalist.
ksrymy
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Re: Mad Men

Post by ksrymy »

If Lane goes off the show before Pete, I will riot. Also, I agree about Don and Joan, Tee.

The Hare Krishna deal was spectacular. I thought "Far Away Places" and the LSD couldn't be topped for weirdness but this is marvelous.

Man, I wish I could have been around in the '60s.

Also good to see Megan standing up to Don like Betty wouldn't.

DON: You're angry. You like it. It's what gets you off.
MEGAN: That's not what this is about!

Now that Kinsey has resurfaced I want Sal and Ken to get their own little episodes.
"Men get to be a mixture of the charming mannerisms of the women they have known." - F. Scott Fitzgerald
Mister Tee
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Re: Mad Men

Post by Mister Tee »

Okay...so, it looks like they're setting up something truly awful for Lane. But maybe they'll surprise us. Remember, when Pete Campbell found out Don's secret lineage, that seemed to be headed for explosion, but Bert Cooper brushed it aside. I'm hoping something similar can happen, because I don't want to be heartbroken for Lane.

It is, of course, piquant that Lane was forging the signature of a man with an assumed name. And Lane's problems are yet another reference back to Revolver, whose first song, Taxman, begins "Let me tell you how it will be, that's one for you, nineteen for me...'cause I'm the taxman"

This episode really broke the 60s wide open: Hare Krishna, America Hurrah off-Broadway. It WOULD be Paul Kinsey diving into Krishna -- he never met a trend he didn't try to surf. America Hurrah, however it may have looked in the excerpt, was a greatly successful set of three plays. The one shown here -- Interview -- is actually quite good. (Or seemed so to me, when I saw it in college)

Oh, and, yes, hard as it may be to believe after over 40 years of the franchise, Star Trek in real time was a ratings bomb constantly threatened with cancellation.

Ah, Don & Joan. They don't have many scenes together (the last major one I can recall was on the lawnmower accident episode), but the Hamm/Hendricks chemistry is sensational. And I hope Matthew Weiner is aware that if he ever tries to throw them into bed together, the show's fans will scream unanimously in protest.
ksrymy
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Re: Mad Men

Post by ksrymy »

Mister Tee wrote:For once, I have to plead ignorance about a contextual event: I have absolutely no recollection of this smog alert on Thanksgiving that year; my father said the same. Yet, I looked it up, and supposedly up to 400 deaths were blamed on it. Granted, we had moved to Katonah by then, but we went to my grandmother's in Woodhaven, Queens for the holiday, and I had play rehearsal at Regis the following day, so you'd think it would have made some sort of impression.
Here's a picture on this. http://www.nytstore.com/Smog-Covered-Sk ... _7235.html
"Men get to be a mixture of the charming mannerisms of the women they have known." - F. Scott Fitzgerald
Greg
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Re: Mad Men

Post by Greg »

Also, I found it amusingly ironic that, when preparing Thanksgiving dinner in her luxury-high-rise-Manhattan apartment, Megan opened canned cranberry sauce, something typical for middle-class Americans.
Mister Tee
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Re: Mad Men

Post by Mister Tee »

First off, kaytodd, thanks for identifying Crying of Lot 49 for me. I never remember the book in hardback; first saw it as a paperback when I read it freshman year in college. That Pete was reading it in 1966 demonstrates that, while he may be an asshole, culturally he's ahead of the rest.

This struck me as one of the funnier episodes. Betty mainlining Redi-Whip was hilarious. Roger's scene with Ginsberg was a hoot start to finish ("I've got to stop carrying around so much cash" a perfect closing line). And even better was Roger's line about the Rosenbergs ("How Jewish are they? You know, Fiddler on the Roof -- cast or audience?") -- an absolute all-timer.

For once, I have to plead ignorance about a contextual event: I have absolutely no recollection of this smog alert on Thanksgiving that year; my father said the same. Yet, I looked it up, and supposedly up to 400 deaths were blamed on it. Granted, we had moved to Katonah by then, but we went to my grandmother's in Woodhaven, Queens for the holiday, and I had play rehearsal at Regis the following day, so you'd think it would have made some sort of impression.

Lots of intriguing things going on. Betty's power-play failed, and Sally demonstrated she can out-manipulate with the best of them. Don was manifestly unfair to Ginsberg. Ginsberg more or less deserved the treatment, given his infantile one-upsmanship in meetings. But the future will belong to him. Don was in synch with the zeitgeist for the early years of the 60s, but he's begun to decisvely identify himself with the resistant side of the 60s (the side that lives on, angry, to this day). His position of power enables him to score victories like this in the short run, but Madison Avenue, of all places besides Hollywood, was quick to latch onto the Youth Revolt, and Don's (and Peggy's) more traditional style will soon doom him/her to cultural obsolescence. Don's "I never think about you" was empty bravado.
Greg
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Re: Mad Men

Post by Greg »

Wow, last night's episode could actually provide an Emmy tape for Kiernan Shipka.
kaytodd
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Re: Mad Men

Post by kaytodd »

Mike Kelly wrote:For some reason I really thought the song from Revolver was going to be "Good Day Sunshine."
I was expectine "Eleanor Rigby." But that might have been too on the nose during montage of the characters at the end of the episode: "All the lonley people..." Also, I don't think Don would have had the same puzzled reaction as he did to "Tommorow Never Knows." Good way to show the gulf that exists between Don and Megan and others of her generation, at least for now.
The great thing in the world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving. It's faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes a life worth living. Oliver Wendell Holmes
Mike Kelly
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Re: Mad Men

Post by Mike Kelly »

One of the other cultural touchstones of the week was a throwaway line. When Pete asked Roger where he got the ski equipment, Roger replied "Alen Funt brought it." Funt, or course was the creator and host of Candid Camera, a pretty popular show in the 60s. For some reason I really thought the song from Revolver was going to be "Good Day Sunshine."
ksrymy
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Re: Mad Men

Post by ksrymy »

kaytodd wrote:The Crying Of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon.
That is magnificent. Pynchon is easily the greatest writer of the postwar era and still the best of the postmodern era. That the book is death-obsessed and conspiracy-obssesed also helps Pete's whole death mantra this season.
"Men get to be a mixture of the charming mannerisms of the women they have known." - F. Scott Fitzgerald
kaytodd
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Re: Mad Men

Post by kaytodd »

Did anyone catch what the book was that Pete was reading on the train? I don't remember any prominent book of the era in that shape.

The Crying Of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon. That strange looking book caught my eye too so I looked close during the repeat showing.

Looks like Megan left the cellophane on her copy of the Revolver LP. I regret I always tore mine off. Could have saved some beautiful album covers. I miss vinyl LP art. Just not the same with CDs. I had Thick As A Brick with the entire satirical newspaper and Stand Up with the entire band popping up when the gategold cover was opened. Also had Sticky Fingers with the working zipper. Cannot do that with CDs.
The great thing in the world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving. It's faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes a life worth living. Oliver Wendell Holmes
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Re: Mad Men

Post by Mister Tee »

To back up what I said about Beatles' cuts being prohibitively expensive:

http://www.grantland.com/blog/hollywood ... t?id=49129
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Re: Mad Men

Post by Mister Tee »

The title of the episode was "Lady Lazarus", a poem by suicide patron saint Sylvia Plath, so toss that in as well.

Pete's paramour is a real piece of work. As someone noted on another site, if she knew her husband was staying in town, what was she doing waiting at the train station? Trolling for a pick-up? And that final heart gesture was wonderfully ambiguous. Was wiping the windshield to conceal from her husband, or an indication of how ephemeral the whole thing was for her? I don't know if she's going to hang around in the story, but if she does, she's trouble.

Meantime, big surprise from Megan. In retrospect, all her successes at Sterling Cooper are acting-related -- leading Don so easily into the Heinz pitch; the Kool Whip banter. I don't know how she'll do at competitive acting. But I'll bet Don is even more discombobulated by this than we've seen so far.

Peggy had a great show. "Pizza House!" made me laugh out loud. And her "It's not me you're mad at" to Don was bulls-eye.

Did anyone catch what the book was that Pete was reading on the train? I don't remember any prominent book of the era in that shape.

The version of "September in the Rain" played seems to be the one by the Cryin Shames, which would be in sync with the Mersey beat concept mentioned earlier. But Ginsburg is right, of course: this is a Warren/Dubin song from the 30s, not something contemporary. These guys truly don't know the difference. (Do we think Ginsburg is familiar with the original because it would be a favorite of his father's?)

Speaking of which...Don says in that early scene with the client, "We know what the Beatles sound like" -- but Megan proves him emphatically wrong by pointing him to Tomorrow Never Knows, a cut which had the jump on Sgt. Pepper as the Beatles' first foray into psychedelia. It was obviously a pointed gesture on Megan's part to select the song; she could have directed him to Here, There and Everywhere, and he'd have been fine with that. This particular tune highlighted all that's abroad in the 1966 world with which Don will have difficulty coping.

And, to go back to the opening topic...interesting that a show contemplating suicide should end with a song from Revolver.

EDITED TO ADD: By the way, right up to the moment Don put the record on the turntable, I was doubting we'd actually hear a Beatles tune, since they're notorious for being prohibitively expensive. Even last season, when the show touched on the Beatlemania period, the only sample we got was an instrumental cover of Do You want to Know a Secret? Weine & company had to have REALLY wanted that music.
ksrymy
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Re: Mad Men

Post by ksrymy »

Pete's talking life insurance and suicide on the train. He's also a terrible driver. I'm calling it. Pete's dead by the end of the season.
"Men get to be a mixture of the charming mannerisms of the women they have known." - F. Scott Fitzgerald
Mister Tee
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Re: Mad Men

Post by Mister Tee »

Mike Kelly wrote:Wow, Tee, I didn't think anyone would have remembered "The Sadness of a Happy Time" That particular episode from the excellent Run for Your LIfe series aired soon after I had moved from NY to Miami. Just turning 18, I flew back to NYC every chance I got. Needless to say, I was feeling disassociated and down that first year and that episode struck a chord that resonated for a long time. I think I'll dig out my vinyl of "Claudine" and give it a spin. Mad Men continues to find connections to those of my generation that I didn't think were possible.
It had to have been a particularly celebrated episode for me to recall the title, from an era when titles weren't as readily cited as they are today.

One has the sense that Weiner tells his writing staff he wants cultural touchstones, but none of the obvious/commonly used ones. The wonder is that they were even able to come up with one this obscure. You have to guess there's someone in our age range on the team, to point them to something like this.
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