There was a theme of infidelity being batted around in this episode of Mad Men. Did you notice? Everyone is literally coveting their neighbors’ wives. Pete cheats on Trudy (and she knows it, too, which is amazing and awful at the same time) with the lady across the street, and Don cheats on Megan with Linda Cardellini one floor down. The consequences of these actions vary: domestic violence on Pete’s end, breathy warnings against falling in love on Don’s. I […]
A Guy Watching Mad Men: This Affair Sucks (S6/E3 “The Collaborators)
The affairs on Mad Men used to be so much cleaner. Don used to enjoy the women he cheated on Betty with, filling some void in his twisted soul. Now we have this new Don, somehow a worse person than the guy we knew the last few seasons; colder and focused on…something. He’s sleeping with the neighbor, and unless Dr. Rosen suddenly says the couple is moving, I really don’t see how that will end well. Pete’s affairs, on the […]
The Old Oxford: Downton Abbey, Gatsby, Don Draper, and Costuming Drama
There was this one shot from the premiere of the third season of Downton Abbey that has really been sticking with me. It wasn’t the epic moment when the Dowager Countess and Shirley MacLaine shared their first scene together, anything having to do with Bates in prison, or Lady Mary throwing a fit when Matthew decided he wanted to be the latest of the show’s martyrs and not accept a windfall of cash that he inherited (days before their wedding, no less). […]
My Ten Bold Mad Men Season Finale Predictions Bound to Be Wrong
While my colleagues here at Vol.1 Brooklyn have been keeping a close eye on Girls, I’ve been following a different set of New Yorkers. The latest season of Mad Men wraps up this Sunday, so here are my guesses for what’s gonna go down:
Afternoon Bites: Songs About Steinbeck, Rules From Kerouac, Heidi Julavits Interviewed, And More
“Be crazy dumbsaint of the mind” Hey, it’s the Jack Kerouac guide to life (and also to prose). At Capital New York, Jacob Silverman talks to Heidi Julavits. “What I was coming to understand, though, was that my mother did not come into the world fully formed in 1981, when I was born, that there was a complicated and somehow painful life that predated me.” Elisabeth Donnelly on watching Mad Men with her mother. Anthology Film Archives is hosting a […]
AMC is Advertising Television’s Best and Worst Show at the Same Time
In his conversation with the New York Times, Mad Men’s Svengali, Matthew Weiner, described what he referred to as AMC’s “growing pains.” Since Mad Men’s debut, and with addition of Breaking Bad, AMC has had to come to terms with being a network not simply a channel. Nowhere is that more clear than on a stroll along any Brooklyn or lower Manhattan Subway platform. Separated by an ad for American Pie 4: This Time It’s Pie-sonal and something called […]
Morning Bites: Swans, Paris Review Awards, White Male Nerds, Encyclopedia Britannica, Mad Men and Race, and More
Amie Barrodale has won the Paris Review’s Plimpton Prize, and Adam Wilson captured the Terry Southern Prize for Humor. Goodbye Encyclopedia Britannica. The 244-year-old encyclopedia will cease print. Irin Camron goes to SXSW and find that white dudes pretty much dominate nerd culture. A Nick Drake film for you. The new Swans album is going to feature Karen O. and Low. Does Mad Men handle race in the 1960s accurately? Follow Vol. 1 Brooklyn on Twitter, Facebook, Google + and our Tumblr.
Weekend Bites: Rachel Shukert: Zionist Conspiracy, Mad Men Books, Alex Trebek is 70, and More
Rachel Shukert: total Zionist to the max. Three Guys One Book talk to Natasha Vargas-Cooper, author of Mad Men Unbuttoned. Alex Trebek is seventy? What? The Daily Beast talks about Marc Bolan. “Allah Right by Me“