Mad Men
The West Wing, Sex and the City, The Sopranos, Six Feet Under, 24, The Wire... How much more of this dramatic excellence can we take? Is there not a danger of fatigue setting in? Sorry, can't answer that question because we've become maddicts — as fans of Mad Men are known. The Rainy Day sister put the first season in our Xmas stocking and it's simply enthralling. Topical, too.
In Episode Six, Don Draper (Jon Hamm) meets representatives of the Israeli Tourism Bureau, who want to turn their country into a visitor destination. "If Beirut is the Paris of the Middle East, we'd like Haifa to be the Rome," they say. As Don does lunch with Rachel Menken (Maggie Siff) he asks for her advice. Jews have lived in exile, she says, first in Babylon and then all over the world. "We've managed to make a go of it," she continues. "It might have something to do with the fact that we thrive at doing business with people who hate us."
Later, after the sexually voracious Don has had his post-lunch tryst with the artistic Midge Daniels (Rosemarie DeWitt ), Roy pops in and invites them to see a friend, Ian, perform in Greenwich Village. The besuited and bemused Don listens to the beatnik crowd discuss their anti-establishment plans to create a cooperative theatre, and when Roy finds out Don's in advertising, he asks how he sleeps at night. "On a bed made of money," Don replies.
Finally, when the Dylanesque Ian takes the stage and begins to sing "By the Waters of Babylon" one can almost hear the wheels of an ad campaign begin to click in Don's brain. With its non-stop smoking, drinking, sex, sparkling writing, brilliant acting and its unsparing look at 1960s materialism, Mad Men is seriously good entertainment.
