Is Don getting a clue? This week he seemed intent on cleaning up his act in general, and sobering up in particular. He even started keeping a journal. I immediately wondered if this was part of some organized get-sober campaign, but perhaps he was inspired by discovering that Roger is writing a book. Anyway, as Don struggled to redefine his place in the world, Joan tried to hold on to spot in the SCDP hierarchy.
Don (Jon Hamm) wrote his journal longhand because typing felt like work (Don’t I know it, brother!). “Gain a modicum of control over the way I feel. I wanna wake up.” One of his first observations: They say as soon as you have to cut down on drinking, you have a drinking problem. As I have been noting all season, he certainly has been losing his touch. Throughout the episode, Don was aware of people drinking casually at the office; aware of the bottles on his sideboard. He tried to resist with coffee. It seems that he also began swimming, at the New York Athletic Club (a real place; an uncle of mine used to work there), but he was coughing after swimming just one pool length. Undaunted, he fired up a smoke the second he stepped outside the building. And since this is 1965, waiting until he was out of the building was actually a remarkable act of restraint.
He was also being restrained from taking the kids this weekend, because Sunday was Gene’s birthday (the baby, not Betty’s dead dad). Did I misread something, or was Don actually eating Mighty Dog dog food? At any rate, he was soon eating much better after an evening of theater with Bethany (Anna Camp). Apparently, they saw The Odd Couple (which indeed opened in 1965), because she asked him which character he was. His verdict: He wanted to be Oscar, but was more of a Felix. I’m not so sure about that; Don seems rather self-indulgent to me…. Henry (Christopher Stanley) and Betty (January Jones) come by. Bethany seemed rather pleased that Don’s ex resents her. And boy, does Betty resent her! Betty fled to the ladies’ room to smoke. Later, Henry scolded her for apparently making a scene and drinking too much at the restaurant. “I hate him,” Betty said. Henry wondered if Don is taking up too much space in her heart. He wondered if they rushed things. She wanted to be let out. “Shut up, Betty, you’re drunk.” Meanwhile, Don was getting busy in the back of a car, and Bethany “making you more comfortable.” “People tell you who they are, but we ignore it, because we want them to be who we want them to be.” Later, he wrote about it in his diary. “To be continued,” she said
The next morning, Don overheard Faye (Cara Buono) breaking up. And Betty apologized to Henry, who seemed distant. He passive-aggressively plowed into “Draper” boxes, then called Don to tell him those boxes of his were taking up too much room in the garage (You see what they did there, likening Don’s boxes in the garage to Don’t place in Betty’s heart). He wanted Don to move them out Saturday at noon.
It was going to be a busy weekend, because Don invited Faye to dinner Saturday night and she accepted. (Guess that breakup Don overheard was real.)
Francine (Anne Dudek) visited Betty, who was concerned that Don would show on Sunday and ruin it. Francine wondered why Betty would let that “sad bastard” Don influence her life. Betty called that perception a lie; she was convinced Don was “living the life.” And she clearly resented that Don was able to spend nights out on the town with young women like Bethany, while Betty was raising his kids. But Francine pointed out that that meant Don has nothing to lose, while she has everything.
When Saturday rolled around, Don quietly picked up the boxes – which Roger had “helpfully” piled at the curb. Not that it mattered; Don dumped the boxes into a Dumpster, unopened. Later, as he prepared for his date with Faye – a date he had been trying to land for weeks – we heard his voice-over (apparently from his journal) musing, “We’re ruined because we get these things, and wish that we hadn’t.” Not exactly as novel observation, but clearly an epiphany for him. When he met with Faye, he rhapsodized about swimming. Faye revealed that her father owned a candy store and had friends who were mobbed up. “He’s a handsome two-bit gangster, like you,” she noted. Don confessed that he wasn’t attending his 2-year-old’s birthday party, because, “I’m not welcome,” and, the child “thinks that man is his father.”
In the back of the cab later, they made out. She asked where he lived, but he insisted on taking her home, “because that’s as far as I can go right now.” What’s this? Don resisting taking advantage of a woman offering herself up to him? A woman he has lusted after for months? Maybe he really is trying to turn over a new leaf. Don had a swim, and then showed at the party. Betty handed Gene to him, telling Henry, “We have everything.” Hmm… now even Betty is getting Zen?
At the SCDP offices, Joey (Matt Long) and Stan (Jay R. Ferguson) were trying to rattle a candy machine, but “mom” Joan (Christina Hendricks) scolded them for causing a ruckus in the office. When Joey cracked wise, she summoned him into her office. He continued to diss her, referring to her as a “madam from a Shanghai whorehouse,” and saying she walks around like she’s trying to get raped. Joan gets so offended and furious that she goes home, where she encounters fiancé Greg (Sam Page), and they start making out. As usual, she was upset about him leaving for basic training. (It’s implied that he is actually leaving at last.) She lamented having no one to talk to once he’s gone, and when he told her to talk to her friends at work, she burst into tears. Back at the office, Peggy took it upon herself to lambaste Joey for disrespecting Joan, but he wasn’t having it. “Every company has a Joan; my mother was a Joan,” he snarked, calling her a “glorified secretary” who acted like she runs the place.
When Don asked Joan to bring on free-lancer Joey full-time, she argued against doing it, noting that there had been some complaints about his rude behavior. This did not appear to be true, and Peggy tried to call her on it, but Joan brushed her off. Don dismissed Joey’s boorishness: “Boys will be boys.”
Speaking of boys, Harry (Rich Sommer) told Joey that PEYTON PLACE was looking for a fresh young face with an edge. After turning away an offer to appear on the soap, he told Peggy that Harry was hitting on him. Joey was oblivious to the fact that he was complaining about the very behavior he was engaging in: judging people by their looks. And what future generations would call “sexual harassment.”
The hostile environment got even worse when Joey drew a cartoon of Joan and Lane having sex and taped it up where Joan could see it. She was seeing red! Joan marched out and scolded all the boys, giving them her best iron maiden act, but Peggy could see how hurt Joan was. Joan was so furious that she told the guys she looks forward to them going to Vietnam and becoming trapped in the jungles! Peggy brought the cartoon to Don, calling it disrespectful to Joan and to herself. She suggested Joey be fired – and Don told her to do it. He pointed out that he cannot do it, because that will make her look like a tattletale. So Peggy screwed up her courage and confronted Joey. When he remained unrepentant, she fired him. He started to make a scene, so she told him, “It’s just a job, Joey; you’ll get another one.”
Later, in the elevator, Joan was furious at Peggy for “solving” her Joey problem, pointing out that Peggy actually did it to reconfirm her role as a hotshot at SCDP. But Joan reminded her that no matter how big and important she gets, the guys can just draw another cartoon and instantly take away her power – and her dignity. Joan gave Peggy a withering look and snarked that firing Joey only served to prove that “I’m a meaningless secretary and you’re a humorless bitch.”
In one of his more lucid journal scribblings, Don observed, “We’re flawed because we want so much more. We’re ruined because we get these things, and wish for what we had.” In other words, there’s no pleasing some people.
Read at Joe's 