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Analysis: Second Season of AMC’s Hit Series ‘Mad Men’ the Easiest Sell on TV Today

HollywoodChicago.com — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 13:24:24 -0700

CHICAGO – Men in three-piece suits. Smoking and drinking throughout the day in your corner office. Womanizing and objectifying every woman in the secretarial pool.

If AMC’s hit original series “Mad Men” is taken at face value, it would seem that life as an advertising executive in the 1960s couldn’t be any better. But like good advertising, the impressive series knows how to sell the image while the real substance lies underneath.

Christina Hendricks in “Mad Men” on AMC.
Photo credit: AMC

The series, which debuted in 2007, has received nothing but accolades from critics as well as numerous awards.

Christina Hendricks in “Mad Men” on AMC.
Photo credit: AMC

In addition to its two Golden Globes and a Peabody, the series was nominated for 16 Emmy Awards including being the first basic cable series ever to be nominated for best drama. GQ has said it’s “the only hour-long drama we demand you watch”.

“Mad Men” centers around Don Draper (Jon Hamm). He’s an often silent yet handsome and gifted creative director turned junior partner at the Sterling Cooper Advertising Agency. Draper has a beautiful wife – Betty (January Jones) – who left a career as a model to become a homemaker and mother to their two beautiful children.

On the surface, Don is the most uninteresting person in the world. He dutifully listens to his superiors. He lovingly looks after his wife and family. His day-to-day existence seems nothing more than pitching his ideas to clients and watching his back for younger guys in the firm who are gunning for his job.

As the first season progresses throughout 1960, however, layers of Draper and the other characters are pulled back. We in fact learn that Don was Richard “Dick” Whitman: the illegitimate child of a prostitute who died during childbirth.

He lived with a brother and abusive father until he apparently disappeared and reinvented himself. He makes a great effort to hide these details from his wife, co-workers and his occasional mistress. Since the inception of “Mad Men,” show creator Matthew Weiner has had a clear vision for the series.

January Jones in “Mad Men” on AMC.
Photo credit: AMC

Weiner wrote the pilot script on spec while working on “Becker” back in 2000. David Chase read the pilot and was so impressed that he was hired to be a writer on the hit HBO series “The Sopranos”. When “The Sopranos” ended, AMC picked up “Mad Men” to be the flagship for its new original line of programming.

Visually, the show is amazing to view. The colors, scenery and wardrobe give an almost fantastical look at the mod styling of the 1960s. The series immerses itself in the cultural Zeitgeist. In the first season, there is reference to Miles Davis, Billy Wilder’s “The Apartment” and the Volkswagen Beetle.

Amazingly, almost everything is approached through the eye of marketing and brand image. The show starts just a few years after Vance Packard’s seminal book “The Hidden Persuaders,” which brought to light media manipulation of Madison Avenue advertising men (who themselves coined the name “Mad Men”).

The pilot focuses on clean-cut professionals redefining how to sell Lucky Strike cigarettes despite an article in Reader’s Digest that has linked them to lung cancer. Later we see Don Draper debate the merits of advertising with a beatnik. The show is impeccable with its point of view.

January Jones (left) and Jon Hamm in “Mad Men” on AMC.
Photo credit: AMC

It’s surprising that the scene featuring the men of Sterling Cooper laughing to the now-famous comedy LP “The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart” didn’t have them commenting on Newhart’s spot-on bit “Abe Lincoln vs. Madison Ave.”.

The biggest debate the show has started is whether its portrayal of women being marginalized in 1960 is actually still marginalizing them today.

One could argue defensibly, though, that “B”-story plotlines following Betty Draper’s hidden experimentation with psychoanalysis, a single divorced mother being shunned by the neighborhood and the start of ideas such as the female orgasm being discussed more openly starts a catalyst for the upcoming free love and women’s rights movements.

Peggy Olsen (played remarkably by Elisabeth Moss) starts season one as the new girl and lowly secretary trying to fight off advances of the executives of Sterling Cooper. By the end of season one, she has defied convention and has been promoted to copywriter.

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This clearly lays the groundwork for upcoming seasons.

The show’s supposed to travel up until 1970. Season two starts on Valentine’s Day in 1962. Without doubt, season two will feature more mystery and enthralling developments set against the backdrop of the Kennedy Administration, the Vietnam War and the Cold War along with the rise of Bob Dylan and folk music.

Don Draper will no doubt explore new ways to market to a rapidly changing society while keeping things peaceful at home. Masterful writing and beautiful imagery make AMC’s “Mad Men” the easiest sell on television today.

“Mad Men,” which airs on AMC, stars Jon Hamm, Elisabeth Moss, Vincent Kartheiser, January Jones, Christina Hendricks, Bryan Batt, Michael Gladis, Aaron Staton, Rich Sommer and John Slattery. The second season began on July 27, 2008 and airs on Sundays at 9 p.m. CST.

By DUSTIN LEVELL
Senior Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
dustin@hollywoodchicago.com

Amy Ryan of ‘Gone Baby Gone,’ ‘The Wire’ Signs Onto New Episodes of NBC Hit TV Show ‘The Office’

HollywoodChicago.com — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 23:22:52 -0700

CHICAGO – Amy Ryan’s star just keeps rising. The breakout actress from HBO’s “The Wire,” who was nominated for a Golden Globe and Academy Award for her role in “Gone Baby Gone,” will be featured in at least five episodes on this coming season of NBC hit TV show “The Office”.

Amy Ryan from “Gone Baby Gone,” “The Wire” and “The Office”.
Photo credit: (source)

In season four’s finale of “The Office” (entitled “Goodbye, Toby”), Amy Ryan’s character (Holly Flax) took over the HR position from Toby Flenderson (played by Paul Lieberstein).

With the 2007 finale being her first episode, Holly was teased as a potential love interest for branch boss Michael Scott (portrayed by Steve Carell). Last week, Carell signed on to do three more seasons of “The Office”. Ryan and Carell appeared together in 2007’s “Dan in Real Life”.

“I don’t know what they’re going to do with the character,” Ryan said in a Sunday Variety report, “but as it was written, there’s certainly a lot of potential. It’s a funny thing to enter a show … you’re a great fan of and it’s nice to tell lighter stories. I love the dark, grittier side of life, but it’s nice to take a break from that, put a skirt on and brush your hair.”

Though the fan-favorite Toby is gone from the screen, Lieberstein – a writer and actor on the show since the first season – will continue on as an executive producer through the fifth season of “The Office”. Lieberstein added in the Variety report: “Amy gave the character of Holly an openness and matured innocence that exposed a new side of Michael. She placed her character right on his level.”

Ryan has more projects set for the big screen including “Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Inside Iraq’s Green Zone” and Clint Eastwood’s “Changeling”.

By DUSTIN LEVELL
Senior Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
dustin@hollywoodchicago.com

Interview: Richard Jenkins on First Lead Role in ‘The Visitor,’ ‘Six Feet Under,’ Coen Brothers

HollywoodChicago.com — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 23:40:29 -0700

DeKALB, Ill. – Richard Jenkins is a familiar if not overly recognizable character actor. With his distinctly grave voice, he’s best known for his turn as the dead father in the seminal HBO series “Six Feet Under”. But he has also had numerous film roles – most notably with the filmmaking brothers Joel Coen and Ethan Coen along with Peter Farrelly and Bobby Farrelly.

Born and raised in DeKalb, Ill., Jenkins moved to the east coast after college to pursue theater work with the Trinity Repertory Company in Providence, R.I. Now residing there, Jenkins has carved a character niche in TV and movies from Providence.

Richard Jenkins in “The Visitor”.
Photo credit: Overture Films

HollywoodChicago.com recently interviewed Jenkins about his first leading male role in the new film “The Visitor,” his “Six Feet Under” experience and his life as an actor.

‘The Visitor’

HollywoodChicago.com: In “The Visitor,” how are you as an individual most like the character you play (Walter Vale)? Conversely, how are you unlike him?
Richard Jenkins: Like him, I’m a little hesitant to do new things and try new things. I get stuck in a box a bit – but hopefully not to the degree that Walter Vale has. But I do understand him. I understand looking for different answers in the same place and not finding them.

I understand isolation and I’m a little shy, which is in Walter. I’m unlike him since I’m a little more hyper. I think physically I’m different from Walter. I’m a little more animated.

HC: What is the origin of your association with the writer and director of the film (Thomas McCarthy)? Since he wrote Walter Vale with you in mind, how did he help you and how did you help him develop Walter from the page to the character?
RJ: We barely knew each other. We did know enough to say “hi” because we had the same agent. But we were in Los Angeles doing a movie, staying at the same motel and doing different movies. He saw me in the lobby and asked me to get something to eat. So we went out and talked for a couple hours about everything.

A year-and-a-half later, he calls and says he wrote this part for me. It’s the part he had been thinking about. He thought about me as Walter after he had dinner with me. He said he wrote Walter with my voice in his head. We then rehearsed it for two weeks.

He rewrote as we went along while the other two leads and I basically hung out. We had meals together, we rehearsed and we talked and laughed. We really became friends. The things we were saying in rehearsal would sometimes end up in the script the next day in a much clearer and more interesting way.

It really evolved. At the same time, this was his movie and his script. He knew what he wanted it to be. Basically the script I read was the script we shot.

HC: When Walter has the angry breakdown in the immigration detention center, what decisions as an actor did you make in approaching how angry he would get?
RJ: I did it in a bunch of different ways, but I kept thinking: “This is Walter’s breakdown.” I didn’t want to do it by tearing apart the room. There was a certain decorum even in that for him. It’s anger, yes, but it’s also impotence. You can change anything in the situation. He realizes there is nothing he can do.

HC: Following Sept. 11, 2001, laws and attitudes toward immigration rights are a major plot point in “The Visitor”. Was it Thomas McCarthy’s intention to expose how good people are painted with the same brush as terrorists?
RJ: I always thought when I read this script (and it holds true in life) that everything changes when you know someone. Everything changes when there’s somebody sitting behind that detention center glass who is your child or your friend.

The ability to stand in someone’s shoes before we judge is important. There is a whole world of experience out there that we sometimes shut ourselves from – not intentionally – but we do. It’s simply better if we know each other than if we don’t.

Richard Jenkins (left) and Hiam Abbass in “The Visitor”.
Photo credit: Overture Films

HC: Since you have a great deal of experience with stage work, what classic theater character do you equate Walter Vale with and why?
RJ: Elwood Dowd from “Harvey” – you know, the guy who talks to the rabbit – except he has a friend and Walter doesn’t have a friend.

Richard Jenkins: The Actor

HC: You’ve been on a number of film sets with many different directors. What type of set atmosphere do you prefer with your acting style? Without naming names, what type of set experience is not conducive to your preference?
RJ: I’ve never been asked that. It’s an important question.

It even determines the movie I will do and how I feel the working conditions will be. I like relaxed sets. I like to feel that I can make a mistake without feeling like I’m costing somebody money. I like a sense of freedom. I like it when people are open and are willing to let you do your work.

When there is tension, arguments and money problems, it’s tough to do your work. Some people thrive on that. I don’t.

HC: You have now worked with the Coen brothers on three films. What kind of sensibility do they bring to their stories and characters that you most connect to?
RJ: They trust you. They cast you because they see you as their character.

It’s a very relaxed and easy atmosphere with them. Still, they make these incredibly intense, interesting and complicated films. They move very fast because they know what they want. Still, they are also open for you to bring to your character what you see. It’s a great environment to work with them.

HC: How did growing up in the DeKalb, Ill. during the 1960s impact your decision of becoming an actor?
RJ: I went to the movies in DeKalb at the Egyptian Theater. That’s how I saw the world. I saw “Goldfinger” and thought: “Wow!” It didn’t matter what was playing. We went. I fantasized about it, but as for being in the movies, I thought that was like going to the moon. I didn’t know how you did that.

When the opportunity arose to actually work in film, I jumped right in. It fulfilled all my fantasies about it. There’s nothing like walking onto a Hollywood sound stage. You walk onto Warner Brothers and on those big sound stages that have been there for years there’s a list of every movie ever shot there.

You are in the same place where Spencer Tracy, Errol Flynn, Jimmy Cagney and Humphrey Bogart made movies.

‘Six Feet Under’

HC: I was always struck by the dichotomy between Nathaniel Fisher, your character and the character of Nate’s wife (Ruth). What do you think Nate and Ruth’s relationship in life was about? Why do you think your character greeted her after her death at the end of the show?
RJ: I had an idea, but I never really knew who this guy was because he was only alive in the show (literally) for a minute and a half. Every time I appeared, it was another character’s impression of him. Everyone saw him in a different way. In truth, I never knew who he really was.

I also know, though, that there was something special between Ruth and Nate when they were really young. When she died, she thought of him.

HC: How did you collaborate with series creator Alan Ball on the character?
RJ: I was only supposed to be in the pilot, but Alan said: “When your father dies, you never really stop thinking about him.” So, he asked me to come back and do more. He could be brutal to his family, but really it was about the character being brutal to themselves like self-loathing or a lack of confidence.

HC: Since you only appeared in the show periodically, how were you able to develop the excellent father-son connection between your character and the characters played by Peter Krause and Michael C. Hall?
RJ: They are really good actors. We all started the show together. We started with the pilot. We didn’t know what it was going to be like. We all became friends. It was really fun coming back during my appearances to see everyone.

HC: Finally, as a veteran actor, do you have a one-line piece of advice regarding technique?
RJ: If you’re an actor, you are enough. You have to believe that – that you are enough.

“The Visitor” is currently playing at Landmark’s Century Centre Cinema in Chicago.

By PATRICK McDONALD
Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
pat@hollywoodchicago.com

George Carlin Dies at 71 of Heart Failure; Comedian a Voice For Counter-Culture

HollywoodChicago.com — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 11:11:56 -0700

CHICAGO – “Death is caused by swallowing small amounts of saliva over a long period of time,” comedian George Carlin once said. The iconic and award-winning figure died of heart failure on Sunday at the age of 71.

Carlin, who had a history of heart problems, went into the hospital earlier in the day and complained of chest pains. Still very active, he had just performed last weekend in Las Vegas.

Legendary comedian George Carlin.
Photo credit: Public domain

With an extensive career in comedy for more than 50 years, it was announced just days ago that George Carlin would be 2008’s recipient of the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor at The Kennedy Center in Nov. 2008.

Carlin got his big break on “The Merv Griffin Show” in the 1950s playing such memorable characters as “Al Sleet”. He would give the night’s forecast as simply: “Dark, darker, then some widely scattered light in the morning.”

Throughout the 1960s, Carlini made more than 80 appearances on “The Ed Sullivan Show” and Johnny Carson’s “The Tonight Show” as well as a recurring role on the television show “That Girl”. His first album in 1967 “Take-Offs and Put-Ons” featured Carlin’s mastery of wordplay and won him rave reviews.

Carlin felt the need to change in the 1970s. During this time, he shed his clean-cut suit and tie look and became more in touch with counter-culture by picking up the mantle left behind by Lenny Bruce. In 1972, Carlin won a Grammy for his album “FM & AM,” which featured a mix of his older humor and new, edgier style.

His seminal album from the same year “Class Clown” contained his famous “Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television”. This led to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling about which words are found to be indecent for FCC broadcast during hours in which children might be listening. In 1975, he was the first person to host “Saturday Night Live”.

A voice for the counter-culture, Carlin was candid about his illicit drug use, disdain for the government and strong opposition to all forms of religion. Though typically thought of as an atheist, Carlin once described himself as a “Frisbeetarian” (when you die, your soul flies up to the roof and gets stuck).

The comedian faced some struggles in his life. Early on, Carlin was arrested on counts of obscenity. In the 1980s, he faced major tax issues as well as a heart attack and two open-heart surgeries. He also had a continuing fight with addiction and most recently checked himself into rehab in 2004 for pain-killer abuse.

Carlin continued to enjoy success as a touring comedian, actor and director throughout the 1990s and 2000s.

He authored several best-selling books including “When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops?” and almost every year produced a new HBO comedy special. Carlin continued to act with memorable roles in “Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure,” “The Prince of Tides” and “Dogma” and for one season on FOX’s “The George Carlin Show”.

Carlin always spoke light-heartedly about death. In a more recent special, he joked about people’s empathy for grieving with these words: “Is there anything I can do for you? Yeah. How ‘bout you come over and paint my garage.”

By DUSTIN LEVELL
Senior Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
dustin@hollywoodchicago.com