Stable is that step backwards between succeeding and failing. – Pete Campbell
My favorite TV show to come along in the past few years, Mad Men has finally returned after a 17-month hiatus with its Season 5 premiere, A Little Kiss. So I thought I’d share a few takeaways from the two-hour premiere.
Above all else, Mad
Men excels at constructing barriers, at forming boundaries between how
things look and how things are. It’s a show about an advertising
agency after all. But it also manages to dive past the artificial constructs of
Sterling Cooper Draper Price to create a smoldering meditation on the
innately human divide between how others perceive us and how we perceive
ourselves.
A Little Kiss is an episode centered on the changing times
and the desires of the characters within this new world. It
begins with a gathering of African-Americans picketing outside the skyscrapers
of Madison Avenue, chanting for equal opportunity; and it becomes abundantly
clear that this season will play out against the backdrop of the Civil Rights
movement. Indeed, racism was bound to take center stage on the show. Recall,
the first shot of the show’s pilot episode was that of a black waiter, serving
a drink to Don Draper as he scribbled notes on a napkin. Don asks the waiter
why he smokes Old Gold cigarettes and not Lucky Strike. And before the waiter
can answer, a white manager interjects, asking “is Sam here bothering you? He
can be a little chatty.”
Racism has been the elephant in the room since day one. So
it’s fitting that this season appears to be headed towards a direct
confrontation with the Civil Rights movement. It’s now Memorial Day 1966. Don
is turning 40. He’s married to Megan, his ex-secretary. Pete and Trudy are with
child. Joan is also with child – Roger’s child. And Roger is doing what he does
best – hitting on secretaries, dining with clients, bickering, and drinking.
Each character desires something small, a nugget of satisfaction,
a little kiss, so to speak. Pete wants his recognition (when doesn’t he?). Joan
wants to feel needed, both at home and at work. Even Lane Price flirts with the
idea of an affair with a stranger. And Don is still hesitant to acknowledge his
true past. So when Megan throws him a surprise birthday party, he naturally pushes her
away. It’s clear Don values, above all else, his anonymity, that he isn’t ready
or willing to break down any walls between how his work sees him and how his
family sees him. "I didn't want them in our home," Don quips coldly. And it becomes abundantly clear: this will be the year of us vs. them, of how we see ourselves and how the rest of the world sees us. And inevitably, there will be many "thems" out there in the world - both in and out of the office.
But it isn’t until the closing minutes of the episode that
these characters’ ambitions are truly put into perspective. Responding to an
ill-conceived (and completely false) ad in the New York Times boasting equal opportunity, a bevy of African-Americans show
up in the lobby of Sterling Cooper Draper Price, hoping to land a job. But as Don, Lane, Roger, and Pete stood before the crowd of hopefuls to break the
bad news, I couldn’t help but realize just how petty these characters’ lives seemed
in light of what the black community desired - recognition, equality,
opportunity - and just how unprepared Sterling Cooper Draper Price seemed for such rapidly changing times.
I couldn’t help but think of the Trayvon Martin case that has
recently swept headlines and spurred outcries across the nation. Don & Co.
are selfish, ignorant, and petty. But they also represent the numerous
privileged Americans who stood on the sidewalks and averted their eyes and kept
their mouths shut. They represent those who have never lost anything, those who
have never been stripped of their dignity or humanity, those who don’t desire
anything inherently greater than the material or commercial. And when these men so calmly lied to the faces of each job applicant only to cover their own shameful antics, how can we feel anything but shame, disgust, and pity for these characters?
Indeed, Mad Men succeeds
because it doesn’t shy away from the truth. It doesn’t sugarcoat the grim
underbelly of our flaws; it doesn’t airbrush our innate fears, doubts, and
prejudices. The show succeeds because it manages to draw parallels between our modern
times and a seemingly forgotten era of sexism, racism, homophobia, and
adultery. And it dares to show us how far we’ve come in the decades since then – and
how little we’ve truly changed.
