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April 27, 2009
Mad Men: The Academy Forum
Tonight, I went to a forum featuring the cast and creator of Mad Men at the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. They started the evening with a clip reel (not bad) and then showed us the entire final ep of season 2. Can I just say I did not trek all the way to NoHo on a school night to watch t.v.?
The moderator had too much Jeffrey Lyons gushing and not enough substantive questions. Seeing the actors was a real treat. January Jones, Betty Draper, is super, super skinny. Jon Hamm is as handsome in person as he is on screen (I was so nervous, I took shaky camera pics of him and Chung). Christina Hendricks, the red-head, has poise for days, curves that never end, and a surprisingly skinny face.
I don't feel like I learned anything. Except that the reason there was a strong Catholic story line through season 2 was because Matthew Weiner's rabbi complained that none of the characters had a connection to G-d after season 1. Also, while the actors have an intense interest in the period, they are reticent to predict anything about their characters and have a lot of trust in the writers. This makes sense since the writers research the minutae of the time (sometimes to the detriment of the show's pacing).
Nevertheless, it was fun to see the cast in person. They're shorter than I expected. Vincent Kartheiser has a weird goofball need for attention, but I was able to genuinely shock him when I thanked him for bringing my life to the screen (really, on more than one level. I do work in account in an advertising firm and well...we'll leave it at that).
Posted by cj at April 27, 2009 10:49 PM