Mad Men C to Z S3E7: Seven Twenty-Three Episode Transcript

Below, find the full transcript for our Mad Men C to Z podcast episode discussing Mad Men Season 3, Episode 7: Seven Twenty-Three.
You can listen to the podcast episode here.

Please visit our episode page for more details, including a form for your insights, a place to vote for your favorite Sterling lines, and other gems from this episode.

If he knew how much trauma he would pay forward, would he do anything differently?

Jenna: Hi, I'm Jenna.
 
Steve: And I'm Steve. Welcome to All Things Mad Men, from Chip and Dip to Zou Bisou.
 
Jenna: There's so much to love about this amazing show, and we're happy to connect to fans like us who discover new things with each rewatch.
 
Steve: Be advised, while we aren't gratuitous with spoilers, they can pop up as we discuss character arcs through the final season.
Let's get started with Mad Men C to Z.
 
Jenna: Welcome to Mad Men Season 3, Episode 7: Seven Twenty-Three. This episode was written by Andre and Maria Jacquemetton and Matthew Weiner.
 
It was directed by Daisy von Scherler Mayer, who also directed episodes of The Walking Dead and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. And she's married to David Carbonara, who composed much of the music we hear in Mad Men.
 
This episode opens with three flash forward scenes. Peggy is in bed with a man, but we can't see who it is.
Betty is in a floral dress on a fainting couch we've never seen before,
and Don is passed out on a motel room floor.
 
Steve: Per Matt Weiner's comments, it's a little bit of a film noir start.
Now we're going to go back with flashbacks to find out how we got these three characters into these three predicaments.

 
Jenna: We stay with Don's character as he wakes up, touches his bloody face and rubs his neck, and then we flashback to see him getting dressed in the morning.
 
It's quite a contrast as Don Draper spiffs up his shoes, fastens his cuffs, and comes downstairs looking very handsome and put together.
 
Steve: Betty has an interior decorator in the house, and they're going over the changes she wants to make to the layout of their living room,
Don gets dragged into it. Betty asks for the benefit of his eye, insists on it, and as he's on his way out the door, with sort of a flippant effort, Don says that they should move the table and lamp to the other end of the couch.
Of course, the interior decorator ponders this and then thinks he might be right.
 
Jenna: It's also clear that Betty is like a librarian who likes books more than the people who come to read them.
She can choose the decorative pieces for her house all day, but she has to ask what goes here?
 
And the decorator explains, that's your hearth, the soul of your home, where people gather around.
And that Betty misses this is so fundamental to her character. It seems like a contradiction, because she does everything for other people so that they'll see her a certain way.
 
But at the same time, she isn't thinking about what they need or how they feel, especially when you think about her family.
She's not planning this room for the happy times they're going to have together.
 
And Don has a similar disinterest. When pressed to give the answer, he does exactly what he did with Conrad Hilton's country  / city mouse ad campaign. He takes one look, he offers a single sentence explaining why it doesn't work, and he's not invested in his home.
 
Steve: We have this contrast between the cosmetic of how things look and there's no consideration of function or substance - just reiterates your point.
 
Jenna: This actress who plays the decorator, Susan Krebs, has an acting resume that goes back to 1977, including an appearance on MASH as a nurse, along with other well-known series, and a role in Million Dollar Baby.
 
 
Steve: The next scene takes us to Roger and Don in the elevator going up to the office.
Roger's grousing about Ogilvy's book Confessions of an Ad Man.
It turns out that that book hadn't been published at this point in time,
so the writing device to get around it is that they've sent advanced copies out so that other ad men can make comments about it.
And we can see that Roger's pretty jealous about this.
 
Jenna: There's also a line from Roger about ad guys being as reviled as lawyers.
And this episode is an exploration of how Don has some disgust about who he is and what he's become.
 
And you also think of Roger as being the boss and he's scorekeeping every bit as much in his way as the Paul, Pete, Harry crowd in terms of who's ahead, and how that affects their chances of success.
 
And it's interesting that Roger is much more open about his feelings with Don. He's not really hiding his jealousy here of Ogilvy, but Don feels it and never reciprocates.
 
Steve: Another funny point that comes out of the commentary is that this book, Confessions of an Ad Man doesn't really say much. It's just this self aggrandizing account of Ogilvy's role in the ad business.
 
But it's highly successful from a publicity standpoint because it gains notoriety for Ogilvy's agency and for himself.
 
So I love the humor of Roger being jealous of this book, which he criticizes for lacking substance when that actually is at the heart of it, which would be the criticisms of these hollow, shallow Mad Men.
 
Jenna: I also can't resist talking about Roger's line when he says he watched the sun rise today.
How was it? Don asks.
Average, Roger answers. [Laughing]
 
Just as an aside, if you've read or listened to John Green's The Anthropocene Reviewed, the premise is that our tendency to give numeric ratings to complex experiences is faulty.
Greene discusses a selected experience or a concept or something and proceeds to say things like,
I give sunsets five stars.
 
Roger here skips that discussion, and apparently he's pretty demanding when it comes to sunrises.
John Slattery gets all the best lines.
 
 
Steve: Arriving in the office, Don sees the frat boys waiting around outside his office and quickly learns that Connie Hilton is waiting.
 
Everyone's aflutter. This is a big wheel. This is the type of celebrity businessman that's not a normal presence around Sterling Cooper operation.. He's sitting in Don's office waiting for him.
 
Jenna: Don tells the office guys to come back in 20 minutes, and Paul goes, it's okay. Take an hour if you want.
And Harry barks. He wants to look busy! [Laughing]
 
And as he goes in, Don says, Allison, hold my calls. And her face -
she gives him one of my favorite looks in the whole series.
Should I hold your calls, Don? Should I really?
 
Thank you, Alexa Alemani, because I look forward to this moment every single rewatch.
 
Steve: This is obviously the follow up to the earlier conversation Don had with Connie, where Connie had said, look, you know, you can start with my New York hotels.
 
The interesting thing about this interaction, though, is that as Don enters the office, Connie is seated at his desk, making himself completely at home.
And we realize very quickly that the power dynamic here is completely shifted from what we're used to, where it's Don Draper, large and in charge in his office.
In this case, it's almost like Don is the child and Hilton is the adult.
 
He starts launching into why is Don coming in so late?
(He) talks about spending more time with family, people should read the Bible.
We just get this sense that Conrad Hilton is a certain type of client that we haven't really seen at Sterling Cooper to this point,
and he's going to be the one banging the drum and playing the tune that everyone's going to have to march to.
 
And this includes creative genius Don Draper, who to this point we've seen pushing back on clients and insisting on having things his way.
 
Jenna: Yes, Conrad criticizes Don's lack of Bible and family photos,
and the absence of these things is so on brand for Don Draper.
He's not tied to an identity if his office has no personal items.
 
He resists being involved in decorating his home, and he doesn't do that in his office either.
And it's so striking because we saw that Lane has a suit of armor, and Bert has the octopus painting.
Don's office could be anyone's office, and that's by design.
 
Steve: And even in his defensiveness in response to Conrad Hilton, where Don says, maybe I was late because I was busy at home reading the Bible to my family, you know, there's a snark to that comment.
 
And we can see Conrad Hilton pause, and he asks if Don is nervous because he's feeling it's difficult to talk to him right now.
And Don confesses that, you know, it is a surprise to see Connie Hilton in his office.
And Hilton seems to like that answer. And he chuckles a little bit and smiles and lightens the mood.
 
But again, it's very clear that Conrad Hilton is the one in charge and deciding whether things are going to be tense or whether they're going to lighten. So it's just very interesting watching Don jump through Conrad Hilton's hoops.
 
Jenna: Hilton is overly confident and folksy. He says, the retainer is for lawyers. Everything else will be like this, meaning face to face.
 
And he says, having me in your life is going to change things.
As they walk out of the office, all the other people are staring, completely impressed. Don is very happy to be the hero.
 
In the last episode, Guy was striding around, and here it's Don's turn.
And as Conrad Hilton leaves the office, guys applaud when Don turns around.
He's kind of a big deal for meeting with a big deal.
 
Steve: In the commentary where Matt Weiner is talking with a couple of the Mad Men advisors who worked on the show, and it's very clear they are very integral to the writing of this episode.
 
They mention that Don is deluding himself into thinking that he'll be able to advise and influence Hilton and through that, gain his respect.
The wink and the nod they give to us as the viewers is that Hilton is that nightmare client, that one that you can't control, you can't really influence or earn their respect.
 
They're high on power, they're always in charge, and they're going to call the tune to which you jump. I like the reference to that in the writing.
As you mentioned, having me in your life will change things, says Hilton.
Don responds, I look forward to it.
 
And Hilton responds to that, saying, they all say that at first.
So Hilton is cognizant of the effect he has on these business partners,
and it's clear he doesn't care. He's going to have things his own way. That's the perk and privilege of being Conrad Hilton and Don is being sucked up into that world along, with Sterling Cooper.
 
 
Jenna: In the next scene, Betty is hosting a small meeting with Junior League women, including Francine.
This organization was founded in 1901 with a mission of having young women make a difference in their local communities.
 
Here, they want to keep a 3 million gallon water tank from destroying scenic Pleasantville in Westchester County.
Betty says she may know someone in the governor's office.
It turns out when Henry Francis has been in the newspaper, she notices.
 
“You should call him, Betty,” they say.
She's not unhappy to help out.
 
Steve: Yeah, and it's interesting, because in his commentary, Weiner says that this shows Betty's been obsessed with Henry and paying attention to the news mentions and, you know, whatever she can gleam about his life.
 
I think we both had the thought that it doesn't feel like an obsession so much as a curiosity. She was interested from her interaction with him previously in person, and she's been keeping an eye out for a mention of his name.
 
And, you know, there's a lot of things going on in Albany with Rockefeller and the party at this point.
So it's clear she's very aware of Henry Francis's presence, and she doesn't offer any resistance when the older of the two ladies says, you know, Betty will probably have more success speaking with him than I will.
 
Jenna: In the next scene, Don, Pete, Paul and Harry are meeting about Jai Alai, and we get from a few phrases that Ho Ho is still paying them lots of money.
 
Don cautions them not to extract too much at once,
an echo of the snake parable he was talking about with Conrad Hilton in the last episode.
Pete answers, Whatever you want, Don.
Pete never says this!
 
And it's just killing the office guys that Don isn't talking about Hilton.
And finally, they ask how he met him.
Don met Hilton while Pete and Trudy were doing the Charleston at Roger's garden party.
 
And they met because Don and Hilton both felt like outsiders at the club.
If Pete had run into Hilton at the bar, Connie probably wouldn't be showing up in Sterling Cooper today.
 
Steve: I really notice how Don isn't wanting to share or toot his own horn about this Hilton coup.
He knows they're eager to hear any crumbs of information he's willing to share about it. And it would be a great opportunity for him to toot his own horn if that was his inclination.
 
But he's not going there at all with it, really, just providing the bare minimum of an answer, even though they're hanging on his every word.
 
To me, it's an interesting look into Don Draper's psychology of, it's almost like this is his magic fish he's pulled into the boat, and he doesn't want to share or remove the mystery for any of his coworkers.
 
Jenna: I feel like being compared unfavorably to Guy McKendrick previously really did a number on him. He might not be able to get the degree from Cambridge, but when he looks at getting a client like Mercedes Benz, I think Don is just wanting to position himself and be in a better position every time compared to everybody else in the room, because that was really painful for him.
 
 
Steve: And I notice in several scenes he also is diverting the conversation about Hilton to other subject matter, but in this one, he turns it back on Pete and talks about North American and saying, you know, get them out of NASA, get them into Pentagon contracts.
 
And Don really throws out there to say, hey, we'll talk about Hilton once North American is on board and in the bag.
 
Jenna: As the other guys leave, Pete makes a quick, polite request to be part of the Hilton team, saying he knows Roger will be the face of it, but he wouldn't mind doing the legwork.
 
And as you say, Don replies with this question about North American aviation, and Pete mentions that their business is looking strong with orders for helicopters for Vietnam.
 
And so again, we saw the first mention of Vietnam in the last episode, and it's popping up again here as we're moving later into 1963.
 
Steve: I like how Vietnam is starting to come up incrementally.
It seems very true to how that engagement escalated at the time and how it gradually came into the American consciousness until it's this full fledged war.
 
For those of us after Vietnam, we think of it as this full fledged war and this debacle.
To me, I enjoy this time capsule of looking back through the lens of these eyes in the middle of 1963, where there's no sense yet of where this is headed.
But as viewers, of course, we know exactly where it's headed.
 
Jenna: And in terms of characterization, I felt like this conversation between the two of them,
it's a huge contrast from Pete demanding to be head of accounts.
 
He's much more respectful and accepting of Don's answer about, you know, get your work done with North American aviation, then we'll talk about Hilton.
 
He seems to have internalized this prove yourself through work idea, where before it felt like he was relying more on his name and status.
Not that he won't complain to his peers about Ken having the best clients later. [Laughing] But at least he has the game face on.
 
Steve: I wonder how much of it's that and how much of it is simply, he has no leverage here. He has no grounds to insist on being included.
He's trying to get whatever tidbits of info he can about it.
 
And really all he's indicating here to Don is, I'm very interested. I would like to be part of it, if that's possible.
Don is the gatekeeper and he can't come out of the corner without Don's consent.
 
 
Jenna: Next we see Betty calling Henry Francis's office.
He immediately returns her call. And there's some confusion with the kids at home making noise and hanging up the extension before she picks up the phone in the other room and him having to call back.
 
Now everybody is on their phones all the time. But this thing of going to talk on the phone in the other room and having someone else hang up the other phone, it was a real thing.
 
Steve: Yeah. And it's very comedic where Bobby hangs up the phone before she's picked up the extension, which of course drops the call.
And then Betty's frustrated at that. Henry calls back and says they got disconnected. And I get a strong vibe that they're both happy to speak with the other and they're both happy to have this excuse to set up a meeting together.
 
Jenna: Yes. And going back to the scene in the kitchen with the kids,
the writers in the commentary talk about this scene as being very real world family, that on TV you see mothers lovingly sitting down with their children.
They usually don't bellow “lunch!” at them, but Betty does that here. And it's. It's a very real experience.
 
Also, when Betty goes into Don's office to take the call in a quieter place,
she sits at his desk. This is the second time this episode somebody is sitting in Don's chair.
 
And I agree with you, she's keeping the call business-like. It's on topic about the destruction of the Pleasantville Reservoir.
But she is happy to make an appointment for him to visit.
 
We get a quick truth call out here when she says it's practically the governor's backyard. And he agrees it's true, and adds that he grew up there as well.
 
Steve: It's also very date like in terms of the plan, right? They're meeting at Swenson's Bakery. They'll take a hike up to the reservoir.
I get it. We're talking about the watershed in the Hudson Valley here,
but you don't need to take a hike to a reservoir to speak about that issue.
It just screams date to me.
 
Jenna: Yes, and this is a different thing for Betty.
Betty fantasized about the air conditioning salesman and okay, she had revenge sex in the bar after Don admitted to cheating, but this feels different.
 
For two and a half seasons, she's looked the other way while Don hooked up with Midge, Rachel, Bobby, Joy, the airline stewardess,
and whoever else we may not have known about.
I think I got everybody.
 
Betty does care about her reputation.
She wants to please her friends on her committee, but she doesn't really care about a water tank. She wouldn't call Henry if he weren't good looking and important.
 
So I agree with you: it's absolutely a date. And she's doing something very different.
 
Steve: In the commentary, they talk about Betty growing up and doing things that she may regret later because she hasn't thought them through.
I get it. These are the writers. That's the discussion they're having as they're writing the show.
 
My impression as a viewer watching this scene is it's not so much that she's adolescent and making, you know, ill considered decisions.
I get the sense she's just a person who hasn't thought through the implications of her feelings and actions and where all this may go.
Just a very human place to be in the moment.
 
So you end up booking this date with Henry to ostensibly talk about this watershed issue. But there are other implications and other elements to the equation, and where they go or don't go isn't entirely clear to either side. So I don't feel like Betty is especially adolescent here any more or less than Henry.
 
Jenna: I agree.
And at the end of the scene, there's a really great moment for her character as Betty yanks on the locked drawer in Don's office. And then she rolls her eyes. She still doesn't know what's in there.
 
That's really key to why Betty is calling Henry in the first place. Because this locked drawer represents everything she isn't getting out of Don.
All these secrets, his lack of investment in her.
Of course it's much less about her adolescence, and much more about what is absent.
 
Steve: Yeah, she's filling a hole, an emotional hole in her relationship, in her life. And where does this lead? I guess we'll find out.
 
 
Jenna: In the next scene, Peggy is opening a package when Pete walks into her office.
He yanks the Hermes scarf out of her hand and judges it as being expensive: “Give it back.”
 
And Peggy, on the other hand, reads the card which says “Elegance and success, Duck.”
And her judgment is, I wonder who wrote that for him.
[Laughing] I love that detail.
 
Steve: I like how Pete in this scene is trying to make a pitch to Peggy to say, stop listening to Duck. Don't accept his gifts.
 
He's just trying to get at Don through us. We've got a good thing here. Don't rock the boat, et cetera. It's an account man making a pitch to Peggy, and she's just not having any part of it.
 
Jenna: She has this great line when she says, stop barging in here and infecting me with your anxiety, which is exactly what Pete does.
 
And it's such an interesting scene between them when they're both speaking honestly and directly. There's no more flirtation here, even if there are still secrets between them.
 
And I think it's very true to form that Peggy loves the scarf and doesn't want to give it back.
Remember earlier when she was giving Don the baby gift and said, I was the youngest, I never had anything new?
This is a hard thing for her to return.
 
Unlike Pete, who can get expensive things constantly.
This Hermes scarf is a design called Brides de Gala, and it would sell for about $500 today.
So it would have been around $50 in 1963.
 
Steve: Yeah. A luxury item that, in her life, she's never had access to. Nobody gets her gifts.
And I think that's a great point in that difference in perspective. Whereas Peter Dyckman Campbell, coming from a world of privilege and entitlement,
you can't buy him off by buying him a fancy dinner or an Hermes scarf, if that's what he wanted.
 
I like that Peggy reassures him that she's going to keep her mouth shut about this courtship of them both. And reassures Pete, you know, wherever she goes with it, that's firewalled away from whatever he might be up to and that she won't be a source of threat or information about the potential discussions going on between Pete and Duck.
 
Jenna: And we get a truth call-out in this scene as well.
Pete explicitly tells Peggy that Don squeezed Duck out when the British took over.
It's the world against Don, Peggy says,
and Pete agrees, true.
 
But Duck would like to hit Don where it hurts.
Meaning if he could get these two people,
Peggy and Pete, with him at Gray, that would have the added bonus of being an insult to Don.
 
Steve: Yeah. In the commentary Weiner and the ad advisors talk about,
Duck is legitimately seeking talent to build up his team at Gray and perceives Pete and Peggy as representing that talent.
 
But if that talent should leave Don Draper shorthanded, that's kind of a bonus and certainly nothing that Duck would lose any sleep over.
 
 
Jenna: In our next scene, Don is called into Bert's office, where Roger, Lane, and Bert are just as curious about Hilton as the office guys are.
 
This is another scene where we've got the father figure seated, as Don is made to stand before them.
Again, a little bit less agency, a little bit less power.
 
Roger asks, how did you make this happen?
And Don answers, we travel in the same circles, meaning Hilton, and that's such a dig, since he met him at Roger's club and Roger insulted him there, saying, you know, you can come here and be happy and choose your guests.
 
Don doesn't travel in those circles, and he doesn't belong at that club.
 
Steve: The meeting is feels celebratory, right? Lane is really happy. Bert and Roger seem pleased.
Even Roger, I think we detect a bit of jealousy towards Don Draper, but simultaneously, he's happy. This is great news for the agency. They're stepping up into the big leagues here in terms of business, celebrities and rapidly growing marquee businesses, like the Hilton hotel chain at this time.
 
And very quickly, the scene flips from that celebratory vibe to one where there's a matter that needs to be sorted out, and that concerns Don's contract.
And suddenly, once that topic comes up,
the mood shifts from the celebration into, as you mentioned, a senior / junior vibe, where adults in charge need to have this contract matter looked after so they can lock up their creative genius, Don Draper.
Now, they're looking to chain up that talent.
 
Jenna: And it's smart. It makes sense, given what the PP&L execs witnessed at the meeting with Duck.
They don't want another situation where they don't have leverage over him.
Don, though, thinks he's special.
 
He says about Hilton and the contract, “I'll give him my word.”
And he asks if they've told Hilton how much this matters to Don.
Lane says the lawyers don't care,
and Bert makes it clear this is the way it has to be, not just for Conrad Hilton, but but for Sterling Cooper.
 
Steve: I got the vibe that there's a bit of a pitch here,
so they're hiding a little bit behind the legalese that the lawyers are going to want to insist that they have the security of this talent locked in at Sterling Cooper.
 
I think that's true, but I think it's also true that this is the perfect moment for Cooper, Lane, and Roger to leverage Don into finally signing that contract. And that's something that for purely selfish Sterling Cooper reasons, they should want to get taken care of.
 
As we know, of course, Don Draper does not want to be tied down in that way and really values being a free agent.
But you can feel the pressure building on him at this moment.
 
Jenna: We should add that they made it pretty sweet as well. The contract is generous. It includes a $5,000 signing bonus and a three year contract with a healthy raise. They say they're trying to be good.
Bert says we want to look after him and keep him happy.
 
Steve: It absolutely is a generous contract, and I think it further increases the pressure upon Don because to reject it now just seems that much more hostile to this notion of committing to Sterling Cooper and having his wagon hitched to them.
 
They've really ticked all the boxes to put Don into this corner.
And we can see that Don is just looking to get out of the room because he knows in the moment he's got no leg to stand on.
 
Jenna: At the end of the scene, Bert, who makes everyone take their shoes off, says of Hilton, he's a bit of an eccentric, isn't he?
 
Roger has a great face here, but he and Don aren't totally in sync right now, so he has to give his look to Lane and it isn't the same.
 
Yes, Bert, Conrad Hilton is the eccentric.
 
 
Steve: We have our next film noir montage where we see Don standing up in the hotel room with the bloodied face, Betty lounging on the fainting couch.
 
We realize we really don't know the answers yet to how Don got beat up in a hotel room and where this fainting couch came from for Betty, nor where this fainting couch is located, because I almost get a vibe that she's at her therapist or somewhere.
 
 
Jenna: In the next scene, Betty meets Henry at the bakery.
He apologizes for being alone and she fibs that her friend couldn't get away, even though she was always coming to this meeting alone.
 
And as they talk, Henry is open about himself, where he's lived, that he was married, things he did when he was young.
For Betty, this normal conversation is very novel because Don never shares things like this and she reciprocates with her story, too.
 
She gets in that she was an anthropology major and he's interested. He asks where she went. To Bryn Mawr.
She does not say this in Italian, which I think is a missed opportunity, but he still seems impressed.
 
Steve: Henry does talk about the water tank, but he's downplaying his ability to control it. He doesn't commit to anything, but he also leaves some hope that he may be able to influence it in some way.
 
He also reveals that he actually doesn't have time to go take a hike,
so he's going to have to abbreviate this meeting in the bakery and bid her adieu.
 
But it's clear there's a real connection in electricity between the two of them.
Everybody's minding their P's and Q's and behaving very appropriately on the surface, but it does feel like there's something stronger and more emotional under the surface.
 
Jenna: Yes, you can see that Betty is disappointed when Henry isn't able to do the hike.
But also, she is in a boat neck floral luncheon dress with pearls. Betty was never going to go hiking, either.
 
While Betty is meeting with Henry, Don and the other fathers are building sunscopes out of cardboard boxes with their kids and Miss Ferrell to observe the eclipse.
 
There was an eclipse on July 20, 1963.
Totality was visible in Maine and Alaska in the U.S.
 
Don and Carlton are talking.
He has slimmed down from the last time we saw him,
and he says he goes running in the morning, and sometimes he sees Miss Farrell.
This is news to Don, and he asks, oh, do you talk?
No, Carlton says, there's an etiquette to it. One of the things I love about my run is being alone.
 
And this line is so revealing because Carlton saying basically that he feels trapped in his regular life - that's such a mirror to Don.
 
Of course, he's feeling his world close in on him with the contract pressure and the new baby, the house that Betty's redecorating with things he doesn't care about.
He has become a character in his life that he hoped everybody would believe, but it feels empty.
 
Steve: I think this also gives us some insight into Don Draper that we've seen previously, in that this normal life of suburbia is a cage to Don Draper. He doesn't find it fulfilling.
 
In his commentary, Matt Weiner talks about how in many ways, Don has already signed a contract in that he's just another dad in the same old shirt here. And I really get that perception.
He's trapped, and he is looking for excitement and stimulation and adventure.
 
Maybe Carlton's been beaten down after the incident with his marriage and, you know, seeking solitude in his evening run as his escape.
 
 
Jenna: Back at the bakery, as Henry and Betty are wrapping up, he talks about needing to be on call to the governor in Albany, he says, “his master's voice.”
It's an old ad, he says, and Betty is a little bit irritable at that. She doesn't want Don intruding on their time in any way.
 
“His master's voice” refers to a painting by Francis Barraud of a dog listening to a phonograph, an image that became the symbol of the Victor Talking Machine Company, which eventually became RCA Victor in the U.S., HMV in Great Britain, and JVC in Japan.
 
Steve: The look on Betty's face when Henry quotes an advertisement is great because we know she does not want to be reminded, like you said, of Don's work.
And we know we've had friction in the past where advertising has come to intrude on her relationship with Don or how she is viewed within his circle of co workers and the rest.
 
So for someone who's done such a good job and been so charming, Henry has no idea that he's kind of stepped in it with that one little reference.
 
Jenna: They step outside and there are people who have contraptions to view the eclipse.
Betty looks up and Henry sees her and shields her eyes.
He's in her space again, but she doesn't mind.
 
She keeps things appropriate. He offers to walk her to her car, but she says, oh, this is a small town.
She cares about her reputation, and you can see they're so into each other and that they definitely want to see each other again.
 
Steve: They take a rain check on the hike, the needless hike, to discuss the watershed, so they both hang that out there as some potential excuse in the future that they could get together.
 
 
Jenna: Back at the park for the eclipse viewing, everybody has a box on their head except for Don and Suzanne Farrell.
 
Andre and Maria Jacquemetton talk about their plan for this character as somebody who is very giving and loving, which is a sharp contrast to Betty right now.
And then this character of Ms. Farrell turns out to be a little bit of a mess in their words, which they say makes her a lot more interesting.
 
Don lets her know he'll be in town in August, and she calls him out about that.
So now I know that. You're all the same. The drinking, the philandering.
 
She had called him earlier to apologize for how their meeting at school went, but now she seems to have put a boundary up.
 
Steve: I wonder if it is a boundary, because as you mentioned, it really feels like she's the one initiating the flirting previously. Here, she throws that back at him.
I think it's pretty clear that Don is flirting with her, although he's got plausible deniability to say, oh, hey, I'm just making conversation. If you don't like it, you know we can talk about something else.
 
The way she comes back at him at the end of it and says, oh, you know, you're all wearing the same shirt, insinuating, you know, are you any different? And you're even wearing the uniform.
 
To me, that's very flirty and clever.
And I think Don picks up that friendliness and warmth because without it, the earlier interaction, exactly, would feel like a bit of a shove away to say, hey, don't be flirting with me.
This is her looking back and giving him a wink, I think,
and to me undermines any sense that she's trying to discourage him.
 
Jenna: I think in the same way that Henry stepped in it with Betty mentioning the ad, I think Ms. Farrell has done the same with Don here.
 
She says, so you're different, huh? And he asks if that's impossible.
And of course, this is really a chafing point for him at this moment,
because he does want to be different. He wants to be special.
 
He wants Hilton to make an exception for him for the contract.
He wants to be a free agent. And Suzanne is saying, oh, you're the same as every other man standing here.
 
She has this line where she says,
other people don't have as much. They don't get as bored.
I'm not bored. Don insists.
Aren't you? Aren't you, Don? Aren't you bored with your whole life?
 
Steve: Yeah, he's so bored.
 
Jenna: As the eclipse comes, Miss Farrell joins Sally in her box, and Don puts his sunglasses back on and looks up at the sky. He's the only person out of the box.
He probably didn't want to think of himself as one of a hundred suburban neighbors in a box. [Laughing]
 
Steve: I love the writing in this scene because I think with just this interaction, we take Suzanne Farrell from a very cute teacher who flirts with the dads to somebody who shows intelligence, confidence, asserts herself.
 
And we know these are all traits that increase her appeal for Mr. Don Draper.
I think we can see her now as much more - I think Matt Weiner uses the term sexually competent. You know, she's not some young dilettante. She knows exactly what she's doing in dealing with the fathers here on Eclipse day.
 
 
Jenna: Back at the office, Peggy calls Duck. She tells him she hasn't changed her mind, and he shouldn't send her things.
He invites her to the Pierre, where he's having meetings all day. If she wants to give back the scarf, then she can hand it to the Hermes people directly.
 
Don't contact me again, she tells him.
So it seems like Peggy's made up her mind. She has no interest in leaving Sterling Cooper.
 
Steve: Yeah, it really feels like she's shutting Duck down here and in some ways following the advice Pete gave her. Although in the interaction with Pete, my impression was she was saying, hey, Pete, you know, my decisions have nothing to do with yours.
 
My favorite line in this scene is when Peggy asks, Duck, you know, why are you at the Pierre Hotel? Duck says to her, have you been to Gray?
It's a Penn Station toilet with Venetian blinds, which is just a really funny, brutal thing to say about the Gray offices.
 
 
Jenna: Next, we go back to Don's office, and Roger follows up about the contract first thing Monday morning.
Don is evasive, but Roger's already called the lawyer. He knows Don hasn't sent the contract to him to look it over.
 
Roger tells Don he is their David Ogilvy, and if you let them put your name on a contract, maybe we'll put your name on the building - after mine.
 
Don says nothing.
Roger keeps pushing: I need a letter of intent. Grunt wants for yes.
Don refuses to answer him.
 
Steve: Don's in a bad mood here, and it's interesting how Roger is trying to do the soft sell here and say, look, you're afraid of having a boss, but your boss will be the client, and that's who's always been your boss.
 
The lack of response from Don suggests, okay, he hasn't made the sale. He hasn't convinced him.
 
Jenna: On his way out the door, Roger says, the problem is, I don't know if you don't want to do this here, or if you don't want to do this at all.
And we can't imagine Don doing anything else when he's so good at this.
 
Is he unhappy simply because he has what he wanted before, and now he needs something new to reach for?
It's not clear why he's so determined to resist this.
 
Steve: Does it go back to the hobo code?
That the hobo isn't tied down and can always head for the hills at any time?
And if Don has to head for the hills, but he's barred from the one area where he's excelled and demonstrated that he offers a ton of value? If he can't monetize that skill and experience, then is he really free to head for the hills because he's going to have no way to support himself?
 
Although I guess with his newfound wealth from the acquisition,
honestly, he could afford not to work if push came to shove. At least for the duration of any non compete duration.
 
Jenna: It does seem like he's continuing to stand in his own way.
 
Steve: I also think Roger's comment makes it very clear of the non-negotiable nature of what Sterling Cooper needs here.
If Don Draper is their creative genius, they need him locked down under contract, and that's just the way it's got to be.
 
And as much as Roger's trying to do the friendly sale with Don,
I think he draws a solid line as he walks out the door to say, we're going to have to have this. It's not just Bert. I see and understand it as well.
They're not asking, they're telling at this point.
 
Jenna: As Roger walks out of Don's office, Peggy is waiting with supremely bad timing. She says she'd like to be on Hilton.
 
This is exactly what Pete said, and Don told him to go do his other work here.
He's a big bully.
He says, who told you we're going to land Hilton? Because we're not.
Which suggests that he isn't planning to sign the contract.
 
Steve: Yeah, he really unloads on her here and talks about her having her hand in his pocket,
always asking for a raise or a new account.
And he throws insults out, saying, you know, there's not one thing you've done here that I couldn't live without.
You're good. Get better.
 
I mean, that's probably the least insulting thing he says there.
And I love the way Elisabeth Moss acts this scene because you can really see her crumbling on somebody that she thought, you know, had been an advocate for her, somebody who was directly responsible for her ascension to this point.
 
And now she's getting slapped down and slapped down hard.
It's a very rough moment for Peggy. And I think as much as she,
in a prior scene, has rebuffed Duck's requests, I think we can see that the timing for her means that this is going to play quite differently in her mind than simply inspire her to work harder.
 
Jenna: Well, the last time they had a conflict like this, Peggy tried to get Don to agree that the Ann Margaret Patio ad was ridiculous. He refused, and she went to a bar and found a guy.
 
And in the pilot, because of things that Joan had told her, she also tried to initiate something with Don, and he rejected her. And then she got with Pete.
So when Don rejects her here, it feels like an awful pattern that she needs to go get approval elsewhere.
 
Steve: It also says something about Don Draper because he's punching down on Peggy here, and he just had Roger in his office.
 
Roger's doing the soft sell. He could have spoken up to Roger and locked horns with them had he wanted to. And we have seen him previously say some pretty sharp things to Roger.
He says nothing, but here comes Peggy and she gets both barrels.
 
Jenna: He does that to Betty as well. So seeing him be such a bully and being so dishonest with everybody, especially himself, it's - it's not a good look.
 
 
Steve: Don probably wishes he had have been harsher with Roger, because the next scene has Roger calling Betty at home and he's just making his pitch to Betty. He's not even aware that Betty had no idea there was a contract on the table.
 
He's trying to compliment her. She's the woman behind the man, etc.
Betty sees right through Roger and says that she finds it disrespectful and actually hangs up on him.
 
Jenna: She also tells the truth. She says Don is going to do whatever he's going to do.
I wonder if Roger hadn't been so inappropriate with her at their house at dinner in the first season if Betty wouldn't be a more willing ally to him.
 
Also, Roger does give away the fact that, “it's a lot of money, Betty.”
 
Steve: It's interesting to me that Betty doesn't show any daylight to Roger here and keeps a unified front as far as Roger's concerned with Don.
But really, she's learned a bunch of new information and she now has an ax to grind with Don Draper when he gets home. Roger has no idea of the tension that he's just introduced into the Draper household.
 
 
Jenna: In the next scene, Peggy does decide to go see Duck at the Pierre.
The writers say in the commentary that this is another father figure who tells her how great she is, right when her other father figure told her she's worthless.
Duck isn't drinking and Peggy says she'll have whiskey.
You are Don's girl, aren't you? he asks.
 
Just like with Betty to Henry saying, it's an old ad, you know, she doesn't want Don in their conversation; Peggy doesn't like that either.
I was raised on whiskey, she says,
and that phrase is all about, I'm things outside of Don Draper.
 
Just like Betty is trying to be with Henry. I'm an anthropology major. I'm my own person.
 
Steve: It's interesting here too, Duck's pitch to Peggy, because as they start to flesh out what that might look like,
Peggy has her wish list of what she wants. She wants to be the copy chief. She wants trips to Paris.
 
Duck is very realistic in his responses. He basically says, look, there'll be more money, but no you're not going to stroll in here and be the copy chief. You won't be doing trips to Paris. Hermes will be coming here for those meetings.
 
And Duck makes the point to her that this is what opportunity looks like. You know, it's not that you're getting everything or it's a dream or a fantasy.
It's just better than where you are. And this is going to allow you to take that next step.
 
And in listening to the DVD commentary, the ad consultants Josh Weltman and Bob Levinson make the point that having been promoted from the admin pool, Peggy is always going to have that baggage and that identification attached to her when she's at Sterling Cooper.
 
And by switching agencies,
that history isn't obvious or known by the entire building.
And that's one of the values of switching, because she can leave that history behind her and take that step forward into this new identity, this new life that she's creating for herself.
 
So whether she realizes that consciously, and Duck certainly doesn't pitch that to her directly, I think there's some parallel there's with Dick Whitman and Don Draper, where Dick Whitman has to say goodbye to everyone he knew or knew of him in his old prior life in order to live the Don Draper life.
 
In some ways, that seems to parallel Peggy Olson's situation where she may have to leave old life behind in order to achieve the new one.
 
Jenna: Yes. And there's this perfect line that encapsulates that, because she asks about travel, and Duck says, well, no, but you're not going anywhere where you are.
 
And we know that moving forward between Don and Peggy has been a theme, for Don generally and Peggy as well.
I can't, she says.
She's not ready to take that step of leaving everything else behind.
Don Draper is unique in that way.
 
And also, Duck is accepting of her response.
 
[Laughing]
And then he has the most specific pick-up line since Pete told Peggy that he wanted a woman to skin and clean his big game.
 
Duck says, I want to take you in that bedroom, lock the door, take your clothes off with my teeth, throw you on the bed, and give you a go round like you've never had.
 
Yeah, that works for Peggy.
 
Steve: What woman could resist those sweet words?
 
And let's add another name to the list of Peggy's poor or mediocre choices in sexual partners.
 
 
Back home at the Draper residence,
Don walks in, Betty dismisses the children,
and then lets Don know that Roger called about the contract right away. She makes it clear she's frustrated. She didn't know anything about his contract.
She doesn't know about his job.
 
She hears from it, from Roger going behind Don's back to tell her and do the sale. And we can see that Don is not taking this in any way other than just being outraged at it.
 
Jenna: Betty didn't give Roger anything on the phone, but when Don comes home, she basically does everything Roger wanted her to do.
Why won't you sign it? She demands. And Don makes a lot of excuses. And he does some more bullying here.
 
He says, oh, Betty, you think this is about you, as usual.
He says, oh, no contract means I have all the power.
And Betty cuts to the heart of it.
It's three years, Don. What's the matter? You don't know where you're going to be in three years?
 
That's absolutely what it is.
 
Steve: And Don says to her at one point,
this has nothing to do with you,
and it has everything to do with Betty.
 
You know, she's his wife.
It's his job. He's the breadwinner. So just as he's attempting to build the wall even higher at the moment where she's complaining about the existence of the wall,
we can really see here the gap between the two of them and the frustration they have with each other.
They're both just expressing their complete dissatisfaction with the status quo.
 
Jenna: Good night, he says. And he walks out of the house and slams the door. That makes the baby cry. And of course, Betty is left behind to handle that.
Don gets to go do whatever Don wants to do.
 
Steve: It's another Don Draper drunken road trip.
 
Jenna: What could possibly go wrong?
 
Steve: We get a quick glimpse of Don on the road, drinking while driving.
And we also get a quick view of Duck and Peggy in bed. So it's clear now who the man was in bed with. Peggy, although we still don't know how Don ended up in the hotel room with a bloody nose.
 
Jenna: Let's just talk about this very quick line between them two, because we saw that Peggy had a whiskey, but Duck wasn't drinking,
so he's back on the wagon again.
 
But he says to her,
I love the taste of liquor on your breath.
Which at first blush, you think, oh, that's a compliment to Peggy. And then you realize, oh.
Maybe not.
 
 
Next we see the hitchhikers, Sandy and Doug. Sandy is played by Erin Sanders. She might be recognizable from Zoey 101 and Big Time Rush.
Doug is played by Trevor O'Brien, and he was in The Gridiron Gang, and Dodgeball.
 
Don pulls over and picks up some hitchhikers. And can we just say hey, Don Draper, don't pick up hitchhikers, but he will not listen to that advice, so . . .
 
Steve: Well, maybe it's not a good choice for Don Draper personally,
but as the viewer, we get plenty of adventure. These hitchhikers are young kids. They're clearly innocent. They don't pose any sort of threat.
 
I don't have my guard up about them. It's more like, hey, what are these kids up to? And there'll be some company for Don as he goes on his way.
We get another reference to Vietnam, talking about Doug's potential draft status and that if he were to get married in Niagara Falls, then this would allow him to get a deferral on the draft, which seems to be ramping up.
 
Don is very non committal and multiple times states, hey, it's none of his business what's going on in their lives.
As they inquire about him, he mentions he's in advertising.
And we can see their perception of him changes a bit because they, they have a stereotype of, of what they feel about advertising people.
 
Jenna: Yes, the writers in the commentary say that Don doesn't see himself as part of the grown up establishment,
but these young people do see him that way.
 
And he is starting to realize he can't just pick up and go the way that these young hitchhikers can.
There's a truth call-out when they say everything smells good when you're high. And he agrees, that's true.
 
So they give him a couple of pills, and they're the same that his doctor prescribed for him last season.
He was on them when he was drinking with Bobbie Barrett. Look how well that turned out.
 
Steve: I think that one-sidedness of the connection where Don is hearkening back to his own youth and his freedom, and really feeling this connection with these two hitchhikers.
 
And as you mentioned, it's not reciprocated. He's driving a Cadillac and he's clearly a businessman.
At one point, Doug calls him “Cadillac,” and I think that really reinforces this gap between those two and Don Draper,
even if drunken Don Draper isn't really perceiving that and is a little wishful.
 
Jenna: In a nod to the Red in the Face episode, where Roger left the Draper house drinking and Don said Betty would want the glass back,
here, Don left the house with a drink and a glass, and at the end of the scene, he throws it out the car window.
 
He doesn't mind breaking whatever he wants to break.
 
Steve: The next scene fast forwards to the three of them in a hotel room. Don is slow dancing with Sandy. It turns out she's 19.
Doug actually asks how old Don is.
 
He doesn't answer the question, the clue that somewhere in his head, Don Draper realizes the gap between him and these two young people is far larger than just drunk high people out on a road trip.
 
Jenna: Doug cuts in to dance with Sandy, leaving Don to collapse on the bed.
And he hallucinates seeing his father, Archie Whitman, in a chair, telling a hillbilly joke.
This is the third father figure sitting in a power chair in this episode for Don.
 
And Don imagines him saying these things:
You're a bum. You're up to your old tricks.
I wouldn't expect Conrad Hilton to be taken so easily.
What do you make? What do you do?
You grow bullshit.
 
And Don cannot argue that point. He's a fraud. He does make up everything about his life and in his work.
He does want to be a bum or a hobo, running around as he pleases, or at least, to have that option.
 
Steve: Yeah. In his commentary, Matt Weiner says that his father, in this moment, is his conscience.
So these criticisms really hurt. And then even the things his father presumably would respect, you know, hard work and toughened up by life,
he's got those insults of that. Don has soft hands because he's a white collar worker. He doesn't do anything physical.
 
He can't be tied down. So again, there's that allusion to the hobo. You know, hobos aren't tied down versus having a house and a family and having responsibilities,
which I guess is a little rich coming from Don's father, given what we know about how he runs his family.
 
Jenna: As Don grows sleepy, Doug hits him over the back of the head and he falls forward, passing out.
 
Steve: I like the menace of that punch, that violence. It's sudden. It's sort of out of nowhere. And you realize these kids are dangerous. They're not these innocents. They have an agenda.
They're going to roll this rich businessman.
 
Don is unconscious.
We understand now how he wakes up on the floor of the hotel room, finally.
But I love the way the writing and the introduction of these two young people lowers our guards, only to spin back around.
 
 
Jenna: So we get the reveal of how Don ended up in the motel room.
The next scene shows us also the next morning,
revealing Peggy was in bed with Duck at the beginning of the episode.
 
The writers said they wanted it to be a mystery for the audience,
that maybe we would think it was Pete at the beginning of the episode.
 
And the following scene ties back to our third flash forward, when the decorator sees Betty bought the fainting couch that she saw when she was out shopping or window shopping with Henry.
 
And she put it in her living room.
“We decided antiques were expected,” the decorator says.
“You've ruined the whole room.”
And Betty doesn't care.
 
She's brought a piece of Henry into her house, and she doesn't care if she ruins the look any more than Don cares if he breaks their glasses.
 
Steve: I like when the home decorator says, you know, don't tell people I did this. She's washing her hands of it completely. I
 
n the commentary, Matt Weiner mentions that that fainting couch was actually the same fainting couch from the famous Mae West scene where she says, come up and see me sometime.
 
So it's this famous movie prop that is now being recycled here in this Mad Men scene.
 
 
Jenna: The next day, when Don comes into the office,
Bert is waiting in his office.
On his way, he runs into Peggy, who is in the same clothes as yesterday.
Neither of them speak about their conversation from before.
They don't talk about his bandaged face, or her same clothes. They just talk about coffee.
 
Steve: Yeah, and Don's unshaven, so in addition to having his nose bandaged, you know, he's. He's definitely got a 24 hour shadow on his face and looks a little worse for wear.
 
Jenna: Bert, like Conrad Hilton, is sitting in Don's chair,
another father figure issuing an opinion.
 
He says Sacagawea carried her baby on her back all the way to the Pacific Ocean and that baby thinks he discovered America.
Sterling Cooper has carried Don, and now he needs to sign the contract.
 
Steve: Yeah, and when Bert mentions about, you know, sign it. After all, when it comes down to it, who's really signing this contract anyway? You know, we know Bert knows this history of Don Draper slash Dick Whitman and the identity question.
 
And in the commentary, Matt Weiner mentions, you know, Bert is walking this fine line between blackmail and encouragement.
But it all leads back to the same place, which is, you must sign this contract.
 
And I think Don at this moment realizes he's run out of rope and he really has no alternative.
He's tired, he's sore, he's bruised from the last 24 hours,
and he's all alone in the world.
 
Jenna: So Don takes the pen and signs the contract.
But he tells Bert he doesn't want any more contact with Roger Sterling.
The date is 7/23/63, which is the title for our episode, of course.
 
I wondered why Don blames Roger so explicitly for this. I know he doesn't like that he called Betty to pressure him,
but the whole thing with Conrad Hilton is pressure. Bert is equally to blame for the pressure and Lane Price.
So why do you think he decides to single out Roger?
 
Steve: I was thinking that it wasn't so much singling out Roger related to the contract as just that Roger isn't respecting any of the personal limits that Don wants in place.
 
So Roger has hit on his wife. Roger has phoned up his wife. Roger's come in and tried to twist his arm.
 
It feels to me like Don is chafing at the lack of boundaries for Roger and trying to insulate himself and maybe carve out a little space where he's free from the risks and agitation that that has created in his life, at least as far as we've seen in the series to this point.
 
 
Jenna: In our final scene, Betty is lying on the fainting couch when Don comes home.
Don doesn't notice it or her.
I signed it, he barks at her, before stalking upstairs.
 
Steve: So Don feels like Betty got what she wanted, but that's not what she really wanted. It was just representative of the things that she. She wasn't getting, and she's still not getting.
So it hasn't really solved anything from that perspective.
 
So as this episode ends, Don Draper really is at rock bottom.
He's feuding with his wife. He's been forced to sign the contract.
He's got a pain in the rear end. New client Connie Hilton. He got mugged by a couple of young hitchhikers that he picked up.
 
It feels like a very rough episode for Don.
He's tied down in ways that he hasn't been previously, and he's really got no allies in sight at this, this moment in time.
 
Jenna: Sadly, I think our hero has a lot farther he can fall.
 
And I also think he's being a giant baby. He has everything and so much of it, as Peggy said.
So if he would just shake his head a little bit and get into a better spot, I really feel like there's a lot he could appreciate about his opportunity and his situation.
 
But that's not who he is. Which, of course, makes him interesting.
But I'm also frustrated with him, because it doesn't have to be as hard as he's making it for himself.
 
Steve: The episode fades with Sixteen Tons by Tennessee Ernie Ford,
a song about a working man who St. Peter can't call, because he owes his soul to the company store.
 
 
Jenna: We'd like to give a listener shout out to Lisa from South Bay. Thank you for following us on social media. We appreciate all the support from our listeners.
 
Steve: That's it for this episode of All Things Mad Men, from Chip and Dip to Zou Bisou. Visit our website, Mad Men C to Z dot com to vote for your favorite Sterling Lines and to share your opinions on our Double Dip questions for each episode.
 
Jenna: You can find us on Instagram and YouTube @MadMen C to Z. And please listen, like, and subscribe. That's what the podcast's for!
 
Steve: Thanks for listening, everybody.