- Lee Garner Jr. (Darren Pettie) and Don Draper (Jon Hamm) enjoy the Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce Christmas party.
After establishing the new world order at Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce and briefly surveying the rejiggered landscape in the jam-packed season premiere, “Christmas Comes but Once a Year” slows the show back down to its less hectic, more familiarly deliberate “Mad Men” pace.
From the straight-up prostitution with Don and the hooker last week, “Christmas” instead shows how the rigors of the past year have forced Don, Peggy, Roger, even poor Allison to pimp themselves out in both big ways and small during this sad little 1964 holiday season.
Don’s slow decay glimpsed last week is only amplified as he suffers through the first Christmas without his family – and this Don Draper is not holding up well. For a guy so practiced at showing the world only the face he wants them to see, Don’s mask is slipping as badly now as we’ve ever seen.
While always a fairly heavy drinker, Don’s hitting the bottle even harder than usual these days. His drunken swings and misses at neighbor Phoebe the nurse and consumer evaluator Faye Miller at the hastily-escalated SCDP Christmas party were, as newbie Joey pointed out, “pathetic.” Particularly when both women showed enough interest in Don that he likely could have seduced either one if he were at the top of his game. But this Don is not at the top of his game nearly so often right now.
In fact, his loneliness (not to mention his drunken forgetfulness) puts his secretary Allison directly in the high beams of the out-of-control Mack truck that is Don Draper. As dutiful Allison delivers his keys and prepares to leave, it’s hard not to wince as Don grabs her hand and lays on the Draper charm.
LAST WEEK: Read the review of Mad Men’s season premiere “Public Relations”
Don’s always had a rocky road with the women minding his office door. Whether it was the overqualified Peggy or Joan, scatter-brained Lois or gold-digger Jane, Don’s relationship with a secretary most often ends with the poor woman running away in tears.
But Allison, as we saw during the reading of Sally’s Santa Claus letter, may well be the best secretary Don’s ever had. Which just makes it all the more cringe-inducing when he puts the drunken moves on her and she naively buys into his game.
When the sobered up Don all but asks her to forget it ever happened the next morning, sliding her $100 Christmas bonus across the table like a cheap proposition, Alexa Alemanni’s reaction is heartbreaking. Considering what a minor character Allison has been going all the way back to Season 1, it’s always nice to see a mostly background player get a chance to step up in a story and deliver the way Alemanni did.
Meanwhile, Peggy is starting to follow further down the path in Don’s footsteps, lying to boyfriend Mark (or, at the very least, not correcting him) when he assumes she’s a virgin.
Even though she tells Freddy she’s not even all that convinced that she’s interested in Mark, she’s tired of being alone – and apparently, not above telling a few little white lies to smooth the way. It may feel good now, Peggy, but ask Don where all those tiny little lies can get you one day if you’re not careful.
As for SDCP, they’re so desperate that it’s easy to see where they’ll pimp themselves out to keep their biggest client happy. Roger not only sinks loads of the firm’s money into upgrading the Christmas party after forcing himself to invite Lucky Strike golden boy Lee Garner Jr. (Darren Pettie), then Lee spends the entire party cutting Roger to ribbons.
From forcing him into the Santa suit to pictures of Harry and other men on Roger’s lap, you kept half expecting Roger to put a stop to it at some point. But no – to survive, Roger is willing to suffer a few – or several indignities. Of course, who knows whether Roger would be so willing to indulge Lee if he knew about Garner’s full-court gay pursuit of Sal that eventually got him fired at Sterling Cooper.
But something tells me that with much cash on the line, Roger Sterling’s a pragmatic enough guy to do just about anything to keep his client smiling. The unmentioned subtext of Garner’s homosexual tendencies even add another humorous layer to Joan’s not-so-subtle coercion. As she slinks by in his “favorite” red dress and leads conga lines to keep the cigarette prince happy, who knows if it was having any of her desired effect.
Other thoughts…
- It was fun watching Don tear out of the conference room when he was inadvertently hit with Faye’s impromptu consumer evaluation questionnaire about everybody’s pasts. It was even more fun watching Peggy peek over at Don’s paper to glean any information she could as well as Lane’s stifled laugh of recognition when he sees Don head for the door.
- They may not all know the scope of Don’s lies like Bert does, but all of Don’s SCDP compatriots know that there are just some questions you don’t ask Don Draper.
- I’d be pretty surprised if we don’t see more of both Phoebe (Nora Zohetner) and Faye (Cara Buono) in the coming weeks. While Phoebe seems to fall right into Don’s predilection for semi-bohemian do-gooders, Faye’s the brainy, aggressive Bobbie Barlett-Rachel Menken type that also peaks Don’s interest. I think she’s way too much Don’s equal for their relationship to ever have a chance of working out, but I think we’re gonna find out shortly.
- Freddy! Ever since he poured himself into the back of that cab after being put on a “six month leave” back in Season 2, I always hoped we’d see old Freddy back one day. Granted, I didn’t think we’d see the sober, responsible Freddy we see three years later. Whether it’s helping a fellow Alcohols Anonymous member get to a meeting or just offering some wise, albeit sexist counsel to Peggy, Freddy is always a welcome element to the mix.
- Considering his “old-fashion” ways were getting out of step even back at Sterling Cooper, I don’t see much of a future for ole’ Freddy at the even more cutting edge SCDP, but hey – everybody can use a handy freelancer now and again, right?
- Now, if the new firm could just find room for a budding commercial director and former advertising art director with an affection for “Bye Bye Birdie” and trysts with men in hotel rooms…
- And another triumphant return this week – this time, for weird, weird, I mean, WEIRD little former Betty stalker Glen Bishop. I’m intrigued to see whether Glen becomes a much-needed guide for Sally through the post-divorce wreckage of her family or just a 1960’s version of “Swimfan.” It obviously doesn’t hurt that his dad created the show, but considering how great Marten Holden Wiener was during that surreal relationship with Betty back in Season 1, Glen is a welcome return.
- I’m guessing the episode title “Christmas Comes but Once a Year” comes from the song in the classic 1958 Stan Freberg comedy bit “Green Christmas.” If you’ve never heard “Green Christmas,” it’s worth a listen. Its message about the commercialization of Christmas is probably even more relevant now than it was 50-plus years ago when it was recorded.
- And if that’s the episode title origin, that makes two weeks in a row for a Stan Freberg reference (after last week’s “John & Marsha” exchange). Cool shout-out to not only an incredible comic talent, but one of America’s true advertising visionaries.
