Sam Cooke's 1964 masterpiece is the most appropriate title I can come up with for my post on "Mad Men"'s second season premiere. The other choice was Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin'". Either way, things are changing on "Mad Men, at the Sterling-Cooper ad agency, and most especially for Don Draper. Events are starting to chip away at his world.
I DVR'd Sunday's premier and watched it last night and while I can't say I enjoyed it as much as many of last season's episodes I think, after much thought, that this is the direction the show is going. The entire show portrays a world in the midst of change. I mention the two songs above due to their change theme but they are also appropriate to the show in that they're more or less contemporary to the period the show is set. It's February of 1962. About fifteen months have passed since Kennedy's election and the end of season one. Chubby Checker's "Let's Twist Again" is playing as we are reintroduced to the characters going about their day. The opening recalled the first episode of "The Sopranos" second season - or was it the third season? - when we catch up with the characters with Sinatra's "It Was a Very Good Year", and it reminded me immediately that Matthew Weiner, "Mad Men"'s creator, is a "Sopranos" alum - he was a writer and producer over there. The change theme is hit on immediately: new technology has invaded the Sterling-Cooper offices in the form of a Xerox machine; Paul Kinsey now sports a beatnik beard; Peggy, in her new position of copywriter, now sits in with the men in meetings instead of waiting on them.
But, as I mentioned, the biggest changes are occurring for Don Draper. Last season's supremely confident Draper first appears this year (spoilers ahead) in a doctor's office, where he's told he has high blood pressure and is prescribed phenobarbital. Later, he is unable to perform sexually with his wife Betty. He sits in a bar and sees a young bohemian reading Frank O'Hara's poetry. Last season the show took shots at the bohemians; when one of them contemptuously asked Draper, "How do you sleep at night?" without missing a beat he answered "On a bed made of money." This season he goes out and buys the O'Hara book. At work he is pressured by Roger Sterling to higher younger copywriters, a move he disagrees with. At home, his sexually frustrated wife Betty is flattered when a younger man shows interest in her at her riding lesson. She runs into an old roommate who she discovers is now a prostitute, and she is intrigued. When her car breaks down, she brazenly flirts with the mechanic when she realizes she doesn't have enough money to pay him to fix her car. Now, we'd been aware of Betty's sexual fantasies in season one; she imagined having sex with a door-to-door salesman, and she actually had sex, or foreplay at least, with a balky washing machine (don't ask, go rent season one's DVDs). But her actions this season show a woman on the brink, a woman longing for sexual attention. Trouble is brewing.
Besides the actual events, the change theme seemed palpable in other ways. The entire episode seemed a little off-key. The scenes set in the Sterling-Cooper ad agency were somewhat muted, the scenes in Don's home were downright dark, and the entire atmosphere seemed a bit claustrophobic. Much of this was probably deliberate; if you're going to portray a man's downfall it's better done in the subdued atmosphere of the other night's show than with the bright colored confidence of last season. Sunday night's episode lacked the smart sheen, the confidence and glamour, of last season. And Don Draper seemed hesitant, shaken. In the show's final sequence we get a hint about why. We see Don reading the O'Hara book and then slipping it into an envelope with a note - "Made me think of you - D". He mails it that night while walking the dog. Now there are two possibilities here: Draper mailed the book to Midge, his Greenwich Village lover from last season, who seems the obvious choice given her bohemian lifestyle; or he sent it to Rachel Menken, the rich Jewish department store owner. My guess is that he sent it to Rachel. She was the one who moved him; the one who broke through his defenses, the one he opened up to. She broke off with him when he wanted her to drop everything and run away with him, and we found out later she'd left on a three-month world tour in order to get away from him. Now, Don is in despair. At least that's my guess. We'll find out soon I'm sure.
The change theme is reflected even in this final sequence. The show that started with "Let's Twist Again" ends with Don reciting one of O'Hara's poems. That's a pretty jarring juxtaposition and I'm sure it was deliberate.
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