“Mad Men” Recap: 402, “Christmas Comes But Once a Year”
Lest we forget, “Mad Men” creator Matthew Weiner worked on “The Sopranos,” and one of David Chase’s key tenets in approaching his anti-heroes was to remind us at jagged, irregular and usually shocking intervals what monsters we were watching. Sure, you could get all wrapped up in the “romance” of mob life and get a kick out of Paulie Walnuts and New Jersey guido life, but then just when you were starting to think, “Hey I’d like to have a beer and cigar with Tony and the boys down at Satriale’s Pork Store,” then Ralphie kills Bada Bing hostess Tracee in “University,” one of the most brutal episodes in the series’ history, and you’re brought back to Planet Earth.
So after last week’s season opener, “Public Relations,” in which Don Draper (Jon Hamm) seemed to reconcile his status as an advertising rock star after the Glo-Coat triumph, the bloom is off the rose a mere month later, as SCDP struggles with its accounts and plans a Christmas party that, to Roger Sterling’s eyes, seems awfully “convalescent home.” Their dependence on Lucky Strike and its magnate, Lee Garner Jr., is evident every time Lane Pryce (Jared Harris) opens his mouth — they account for either 69 or 71 percent of SCDP’s profits, and Roger hates how Pryce says “per cent.” When Garner announces that he’s coming to the soiree, Sterling immediately insists that the party transform from “convalescent home” to “Roman orgy.”
The problem is that Garner, ever the high roller, knows the power he has over SCDP, and the agency must do everything it can to diversify its roster so that it breaks from that dependency, and that includes bringing back poor old Freddy Rumsen, now a recovering alcoholic fully entrenched in AA and dragging with him a $2 million Pond’s cold cream account. Freddy is very much a relic, a point made by a swift and ugly debate with Peggy (Elizabeth Moss) over how to sell the goop.
But at the core of all this is the cratering of Don Draper. At the outset, Don and the rest of the staff are stuck in a meeting with consultant Faye Miller (Cara Buono), who asks the SCDP team to fill out personality profiles, including questions about their fathers. Yeah, right. Don checks out, citing an appointment, but Faye calls him on it later at the Christmas party, when she corners him in his office in a flirting-but-not-really posture. She’s researched Don, and while she probably doesn’t know about Dick Whitman, she knows enough about Don’s recent history. She tells him, “Don’t worry. You’ll be married again in a year,” and then twists the heel by saying that she forgot that people don’t like to think of themselves as “types.” But this entire episode is about telling the viewer what type of guy Don Draper is during Christmas 1964. He is the kind of guy who is dismissive of his neighbor Phoebe (Nora Zehetner of “Brick”) — strange, because she essentially looks like Natalie Wood in a nurse’s uniform, and unless Don’s afraid of nurses, that’s kind of a universal slam-dunk, especially in 1964. He only gets around to a pass after he’s too drunk to stand and she’s helping him out of his tie. But then Phoebe tells him her father was a drunk, which means Don is not really an appealing daddy figure at this particular moment.
So Don’s striking out until he gets absolutely blotto after the party, goes home and realizes he’s left his keys at the office. He calls his secretary Allison (Alexa Alemmani), who has become expert at taking care of post-divorce Don, buying Christmas presents for his kids and tidying up after his increasingly widening mess, to bring his keys. She takes time out from after-party drinks with co-workers (one of whom comments on Don’s miserable state of late). Allison, who seems to worship Don, becomes easy prey: she seems to think this completely unromantic come-on could turn into something nuptial-related. It’s a dank coupling, to be sure, and later at the office, Don refuses to acknowledge it. This is the “Sopranos” moment of the episode: Don is a right bastard to Allison, who goes back to her desk and starts typing. We hope it’s a resignation letter, but that does not appear to be the case.
What we have in “Christmas Comes But Once a Year” is a study of Don’s interaction with three women who aren’t his ex-wife or his daughter. One is his equal, one is the kind of smart and gorgeous party girl who used to be easy pickings, and the last is his sweet, insecure secretary. He won’t pick a woman who already knows who he is — that simply will not work for Don Draper — and he might have missed the window on Phoebe, possibly by a couple of years. Allison winds up being Don’s fallback position, and it looks like she will be back for more.
And we haven’t even gotten to Glen yet. Glen (played by Matthew Weiner’s son, Marten Holden Weiner) was the young boy whom Betty baby-sat while his mom went out to campaign for JFK in Season 2, and developed a creepy fixation on Betty. Well, fast-forward a couple of years and Glen is now fixated on the more age-appropriate Sally Draper (Kiernan Shipka) and well on his way to becoming a full-fledged sociopath. In an effort to impress Sally after seeing her out with Henry and Betty picking out Christmas trees, he and a toadie break into Casa Draper and ransack the place — all except for Sally’s room. He leaves a clue on her pillow, and she appears to be smitten by this new protector who, at least to her thinking, is doing more on her behalf than Daddy will.
Next week, it’s New Year’s Eve. Is Weiner going to take us through the calendar of holidays in Season 4? Possibly. We often structure our memories based on where we were on those key days, when everybody was either together or conspicuously apart. Right now, Draper looks to be in for several holidays in hell, but Weiner might be throwing us as off-balance as Don Draper was in his apartment hallway.
– Lang
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Comments
[...] Times (blog)Mad Men Review: Christmas Comes But Once a Year TIME (blog) New York Magazine - NewsOK.com (blog) - TV Guideall 85 news [...]
Wat struck me was the introduction of multiple female interests for Don in this episode (and last). Normally each season there is one infatuation that runs the course of much of the year; Rachel Menken, Sally’s teacher, etc. But now Don is so adrift he can’t even seem to muster up a decent seductive stare.
If the holiday theme continues to play out, expect episode four to center around a disastrous Valentine’s Day for Don.
On another note, I’d frankly just assume Betty’s side of the story be written out of the show for a while. I’ve never seen a character in any show go from being the most sympathetic to the least in so little time. I’d rather her disappear with Henry for a while until they figure out how to tie her story back in with Don’s, because I’m not interested in watching two shows contained in one.
That said, I have this odd feeling that Henry will meet a sudden and perhaps grisly demise sometime late-to-mid-season (think “Man Walks into an Advertising Agency”) and force Betty to deal with being adrift in the way she should have after the divorce.
[...] Times (blog)Mad Men Review: Christmas Comes But Once a Year TIME (blog) New York Magazine - NewsOK.com (blog) - TV Guideall 79 news [...]