Sunday Classics snapshots: "Is life a boon?"

Longtime D'Oyly Carte Opera Company principal tenor Thomas Round was not only long gone from the company but, unfortunately, in his late 50s by the time he made the recordings below.

Is life a boon?
If so, it must be befall
that Death, whene'er he call
must call too soon.
Though fourscore year he give,
yet one would wish to live
another moon!
What kind of plaint have I,
who perish in July?
who perish in July?
I might have had to die
perchance in June!
I might have had to die
perchance in June!

Is life a thorn?
Then count it not a whit!
Man is well done with it
soon as he's born.
He should all means essay
to put the plague away,
to put the plague away;
and I, war-worn,
poor captured fugitive,
my life most gladly give.
I might have had to live
another morn!
I might have had to live
another morn!

Revised (standard) version

Thomas Round (t), Col. Fairfax; Gilbert and Sullivan Festival Orchestra, Peter Murray, cond. G and S for All, recorded 1972
Original version

Thomas Round (t), Col. Fairfax; Gilbert and Sullivan Festival Orchestra, Peter Murray, cond. Pearl, recorded in Battersea Town Hall (London), Sept. 12, 1972

by Ken

We'll come back to "Is life a boon?," the song that blossomed from tedium to magnificence when the composer was nudged by his wordsmith partner to start over. But first, let me explain as quickly as possible that it and our other musical snapshot today arise from two convergences:

• While I was waiting for the Museum of the Moving Image screening of Paddy Chayefsky and Delbert Mann's 1957 film The Bachelor Party (an adaptation of their 1953 live-TV version), part of the Matthew Weiner-curated series of films that impacted him in the making of Mad Men, I forced myself to finally finish Ben McGrath's April 13 New Yorker piece on fantasy sports, from which I learned that fantasy sports has pretty well eliminated any connection to the play of sports even as it has exploded all over the place and apparently provided the only reason to live for a lot of people who therefore may be thought to have no reason to live. This was a dangerous convergence because The Bachelor Party depicts a night in the life of five humdrum office mates, where four of them take the fifth out for a bachelor party that unswittingly slipslides into a crossroads that none of them is well-equipped to cope with, at least not without throwing open the question of what meaning or purpose, if any, their lives have.

• And the musical snapshots by that convergence further converged with one of last week's musical snapshots: the tenor's "Ingemisco" from the awesome "Dies irae" of the Verdi Requiem. For me personally, the other peak of Verdi's "Dies irae," the mezzo-soprano's "Liber scriptus proferetur" -- we heard the two together in the April 2011 Sunday Classics post "Verdi blows the lid off the whole Krap Kristian hypocrisy."

So I thought we would just listen again to the three complete performances of the "Liber scriptus" we heard back then -- sung, as I wrote then, by two suitably deep-voiced mezzos (Jard van Nes and Florence Quivar) and a genuine contralto (Lili Chookasian)."(We also heard Ebe Stignani's recording broken into segments.)

VERDI: Requiem: ii. "Dies irae": mezzo-soprano solo, "Liber scriptus proferetur" ("A written book shall be brought forth")

A written book shall be brought forth
in which all is recorded,
whence the world shall be judged.

Therefore, when the Judge shall be seated
nothing shall be held hidden any longer,
no wrong shall remain unpunished.

Jard van Nes (ms); Munich Bach Choir, Frankfurt Singing Academy, Saarbrücken Radio Symphony Orchestra, Hanns-Martin Schneidt, cond. Arte Nova, recorded Oct. 30, 1988

Florence Quivar, mezzo-soprano; Ernst-Senff Chorus, Berlin Philharmonic, Carlo Maria Giulini, cond. DG, recorded April 1989

Lili Chookasian, contralto; Tanglewood Festival Chorus, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Erich Leinsdorf, cond. RCA/BMG, recorded Oct. 5-6 1964, Apr. 5, 1965


KEEP THE "INGEMISCO" AND "LIBER SCRIPTUS" IN MIND

We're going to be coming back to them.


MEANWHILE HERE AGAIN IS "IS LIFE A BOON?"

A song of the splendor of (the second) "Is life a boon?" deserves a comparably magnificent performance, and unfortunately I don't have one of those to offer. Still the closest to me is Leonard Osborn's, which for all the familiar problems of his singing is the performance the not only has plenty of real vocal ring but a goodly helping of dramatic importance. Although as I've said I'm not a great fan of onetime D'Oyly Carte Opera Company principal tenor Derek Oldham, I kind of like both of his recordings, though I'm still bothered by the fake-classy verbal frilliness -- much better controlled, it seems to me, in the 1928 version. I suppose Richard Lewis's recording represents something of a compromise between the two, though you certainly can't say it's beautifully sung.

Which is why I've included the remaining two versions, which are both quite prettily sung but don't seem to me to carry any vocal or emotional weight, and pretty much miss the point of the piece.

GILBERT and SULLIVAN: The Yeomen of the Guard: Act I, Ballad, Col. Fairfax, "Is life a boon?"

Is life a boon?
If so, it must be befall
that Death, whene'er he call
must call too soon.
Though fourscore year he give,
yet one would wish to live
another moon!
What kind of plaint have I,
who perish in July?
who perish in July?
I might have had to die
perchance in June!
I might have had to die
perchance in June!

Is life a thorn?
Then count it not a whit!
Man is well done with it
soon as he's born.
He should all means essay
to put the plague away,
to put the plague away;
and I, war-worn,
poor captured fugitive,
my life most gladly give.
I might have had to live
another morn!
I might have had to live
another morn!

Leonard Osborn (t), Col. Fairfax; New Promenade Orchestra, Isidore Godfrey, cond. Decca, recorded July 18, 1950

Richard Lewis (t), Col. Fairfax; Pro Arte Orchestra, Sir Malcolm Sargent, cond. EMI, recorded Dec. 10-14, 1957

Derek Oldham (t), Col. Fairfax; D'Oyly Carte Opera Orchestra, Malcolm Sargent, cond. EMI, recorded Oct. 29-Dec. 4, 1928 (digital transfer by F. Reeder)

Derek Oldham (t), Col. Fairfax; orchestra, George Byng, cond. EMI, recorded Mar.-Oct. 1920 (digital transfer by F. Reeder)

Philip Potter (t), Col. Fairfax; Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Malcolm Sargent, cond. Decca, recorded Apr. 5-11, 1964

Kurt Streit (t), Col. Fairfax; Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, Neville Marriner, cond. Philips, recorded May 1992

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"Most of us are failing constantly. We're looking for forgiveness. We're looking to make a fresh start" ("Mad Men" creator Matthew Weiner)

Matthew W says: "I wanted to be in an environment where we're not part of entertainment wish-fulfillment, because most of us are failing constantly. We're looking for forgiveness. We're looking to make a fresh start. And that tradition of humanity on the show is something I'm very proud of. I don't see a lot of it anywhere else."

by Ken

As I noted last night, at the March 20 live event with Mad Men's creator-overseer at the Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, Matthew Weiner talked about having been overwhelmed the day before, the first time he toured the museum's Mad Men exhibition (for which he had personally provided a great deal of material in addition to encouraging cooperation from the rest of the Mad Men team), seeing seven years of his life on display. By the second day, he reported, he'd begun to take it in more equably.

Without minimizing the importance of the obviously terrific team Matthew W assembled to produce these seven seasons of the show, there's also no question how much of it comes back to him. So as we approach tonight's launch of the final run of episodes, it's a treat to be able to share this Q-and-A from amctv.com's Mad Men blog, "on the end of an era and the legacy of one of television’s most beloved shows."

Q: It’s the end of an era! What does it feel like to be closing out Mad Men?

A: It sounds terrible but you know, right now I’m not feeling sorry for myself. I’m getting to experience the joy of finishing this — the completeness of it, the gratitude for getting to end it how and when we wanted to. I’m really excited. It’s a very positive thing. Ask me when it’s really over, like a year from now, and I’ll be like, “God, I miss Peggy. I wonder how she’s doing. I miss Betty. I wonder what she’s up to. Did she just drive by?” [Laughs]

Q: You’ve written seven seasons of the show. What’s the best advice you’ve gotten?

A: I got a lot of advice during Season 1 from people who are way more experienced and wiser than I am now… I remember someone saying, “Trust your gut. There’s no right way to do it. You’ll find your own way.” And about six months into the first season, I had a lingering, painful stomach ache every day for a week and I realized that it was from me psychologically focusing on my gut. [Laughs]

Q: You set out to portray the ’60s as one of history’s transformative periods…

A: I believe the show has pointed out that we have been going through a change. But we always are… That period between 1960 and 1965 where we really lived for the bulk of the show was largely forgotten. It was seen as the ‘50s, and people in their mind thought it went right from Fonzie to Woodstock, but it’s a much more gradual thing… The space program with all the beautiful ambition to put a man on the moon was really about a weapons program simultaneously. It was the friendly face of the weapons program. Stuff like that, I learned on the show!

Q: What historical moments did you most enjoy portraying?

A: The show is not driven by historic events. It’s driven by what is going on in people’s lives. Don’s getting divorced. Betty is sick of it. Don is alone. Peggy is sick of Don. Joan is going to realize that her expectations for a husband and a family were thwarted in some way and she has to reevaluate. The history stuff is not important.

Q: Speaking of the space program, if you could only send one episode of Mad Men on a mission to colonize another planet, which would it be?

A: I would send more important things than a TV show to populate a new planet. [Laughs]… And the format is really small, why can’t we send the whole series? I think it would be more valuable if we sent the whole thing.

Q: How difficult is it for you to pick favorite episodes or parts of the show?

A: I get asked all the time what’s my favorite this or that. I lived through all of it. It is tracing the history of both of the companies I worked in. It’s tracing the history of what happened in my life, the writer’s lives, in the actor’s lives. The show is told in the third person in this operatic context to some degree, but there’s so many things where I’m just, “That was a real guy, that was something that really happened to somebody.”

Q: What character do you most miss writing for?

A: I had a couple of ideas recently that were completely useless; one of them was for Roger and one of them was for Don. So I don’t know. I had a story thing and then was like, “Oh wait a minute, I’m never going to do that again.” [Laughs]

Q: Mad Men has impacted so much, from fashion to the quality of writing in television. Which aspect of the show’s legacy are you most proud of?

A: I believe that non-formulaic storytelling — storytelling on a human level with whatever genre that this turns out to be — that adventurousness in the writer’s room to take the risks on telling stories, that’s what I hope the legacy of the show is. That’s what I’m proudest of. And also I’m super proud of being part of a group mindset that’s accepting and nonjudgmental of human weakness… I wanted to be in an environment where we’re not part of entertainment wish-fulfillment because most of us are failing constantly. We’re looking for forgiveness. We’re looking to make a fresh start. And that tradition of humanity on the show is something I’m very proud of. I don’t see a lot of it anywhere else.

Q: Has the Mad Men genre gotten any easier to define?

A: It’s still hard. I have people come up who have no problems telling me they’ve either never heard of it or they don’t watch TV, and all I really want to say is, “It’s not what you think it is…” They’re not apologizing for not watching TV. They’re literally saying, “I’m not part of the lower part of humanity that is part of the mass culture.” And I want to say, “Uh, I don’t know if you know this, but if you’re going to the opera tonight, that was the TV of its day.” [Laughs]

The final seven episodes -- officially the "second half of Season 7," the first half of which aired last April-May -- begin tonight at 10pm (9pm CT) on AMC.

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Frames of reference: I don't know what the hell Alabama Shakes is/are. Do Alabama Shakes connoisseurs know what "North by Northwest" is?

No, you can't click on anything here; it's just a screen grab. If you want to watch the Exclusive New Mad Men Trailer Featuring Alabama Shakes, go here.

by Ken

So I got the an e-mail yesterday. owing to my membership in the highly exclusive Mad Men Social Club (so exclusive that the only way to become a member is by signing up), which contained a tease-and-link for the above clip. No, my blood didn't start racing. Because, keen as I am for the start of this final run of Mad Men episodes (come on, April 5!), I know perfectly well by now -- as we've discussed here so often -- that while Mad Men creator-mastermind Matthew Weiner knows as well as anybody that his product must be promoted, he's not going to let either his own people or the AMC PR corps reveal anything of substance about as-yet-unaired episodes.

(How would you like a PR assignment like that? You've got to try to drive people wild with anticipation without telling them [us] anything that they [we] don't already know.)

I respect the hell out of Matt W and any other responsible parties for this. There are movie and TV promoters who don't give a damn, and we wind up watching the first hour of the movie or the first episode or two of the TV series seeing all sorts of stuff we've already sort-of-seen. No sir, I want my slate for the episodes-to-come to be as clean as humanly possible when they finally come. (Come on, April 5!) Even if right now this is making me just the least bit crazy. Even more so since, as I reported, I zipped through the seven episodes that constituted "the first half of Season 7," as we're committed to calling the episodes that aired between April 13 and May 25, 2014, which sure sounds like "last season" to me. This is one helluva mid-season lull we've been enduring, waiting for the seven episodes that will constitute "the second half of Season 7." (In the event that April 5 ever comes.)

I've seen enough of these phony-baloney trailers to know that they're not going to tell me anything useful. And of course my official position is that I don't want to know anything about what's going to happen until it, you know, happens. It would be different if somebody were to slip me some secret link and maybe accompanying secret code so I could start watching those final episodes, but that's not going to happen. (Is it?)

Which doesn't mean that I didn't watch the damned "exclusive look" trailer. And, as I expected, I didn't see anything that told me anything about anything.

It was only after watching the clip, though, that I looked a little closer at how it was presented on-screen (see above) and then flashed back to how it had been teased in the AMC Mad Men Social Club, like so:



Do you notice anything different?

The e-mail tease was for a "New Trailer Featuring the Alabama Shakes." I didn't linger over it because I knew perfectly well that I had no clue what, or maybe who, "the Albama Shakes" is, or are -- an object or objects, a person or persons, or maybe a debilitating physical condition? I wasn't any the wiser, Alabama Shakes-wise, after watching the clip. But I did notice that here what I was being offered was a "New Trailer Featuring Alabama Shakes," which isn't quite the same thing. At this point I just went to Wikipedia and learned that, as I was coming to suspect, Alabama Shakes is a musical group. They could still be known, of course, as "the Alabama Shakes," just like the Rolling Stones are known as, well, the Rolling Stones, but I gather from glancing through the Wikipeda entry that this isn't the case. I don't rule out the possibility that the person who wrote the copy for the e-mail isn't a lot clearer about who or what the Alabama Shakes is/are than I am.

What we have here is what we might call "a frame-of-reference" issue, and a pretty crude one at that. The promoters of this promotion assume that the promotees will know who or what (the) Alabama Shakes is/are. I describe it as a pretty crude example of a problem with "frames of reference" because pretty obviously the promoters don't care whether I know who or what (the) Alabama Shakes is/are. I am, you might say, safely outside their frame of reference. Fortunately, this isn't exactly the first time I've found myself in this position. I am, by now, pretty well used to it. I'm often more surprised when I'm included "in the frame" of a current pop-cultural reference.


JUST AS OFTEN, I'M ON THE INSIDE OF A
"FRAME OF REFERENCE" LOOKING OUT

Perfect example: Barring unforeseen developments, like maybe getting hit by a bus or maybe the world coming to an end (hey, these things happen!), tomorrow I'm going to be writing a little about North by Northwest. Ohmygosh, do I love North by Northwest, and tomorrow I'm all booked for a real, live big-screen screening of it at the Museum of the Moving Image, the first of the movies chosen by the aforementioned Matthew Weiner for the MoMI film series, "Required Viewing: Mad Men's Movie Influences," being shown alongside the museum's Mad Men exhibition, which opens today and runs through June 14. (I had to skip the "members' preview" of the exhibition last night in order to finish a post, but I should arrive early enough tomorrow, even traveling from my NY Transit Museum tour of the Mother Clara Hale Bus Depot in Harlem, to have a first look through the exhibition before the screening.

Am I psyched for this, or what?

The only thing is, I'm realizing before I even set down any actual words for the blogpost I'm imagining, that I have a whopper of a "frame of reference" problem. North by Northwest came out in 1959. In its time it was, I think, an extremely well-known movie. (Yes, it's a movie, in case you didn't know.) As you would expect, considering that it surely has to rank on any serious list of the Greatest Movies Ever Made. I'm not saying flat out that it is the Greatest Movie Ever Made, though I'm not saying it isn't. I'm just saying that, if you were to try to compile such a list, how it, not only do I not see how it could be left off the list, I don't see by what criteria it could be kicked off as you tried to whittle the list down.

And yet, as I was reminded some months back when I was preparing to take the plunge and was shopping for a Blu-ray edition of the film, and looking at Amazon comments for guidance as to the quality of the versions possibly on offer, a whole hell of a lot of people have, or at least had, never heard of the picture. Quite possibly a lot of people who consider themselves conversant with movies generally, would guess that a film as ancient as this must be in black-and-white -- well, heck, the film Alfred Hitchcock made immediately after North by Northwest, which is to say Psycho, is in black-and-white. And many of those same people might guess that a film of this antiquity may not even have talking. Assuming. of course, that they're aware that there were once such things as "silent" movies.

And wait -- even as I typed the name of Alfred Hitchcock, I was painfully aware that there are a lot of people today who have no idea who Alfred Hitchcock is, or was. No, is, because there seems to me no chance that he will ever be dislodged from the list of the greatest of all movie directors.

Then there are a couple of names that were once as famous as any that have been bandied about in Hollywood -- Hitch's two most frequent leading men, Cary Grant and Jimmy Stewart. It was Cary Grant who was cast to play North by Northwest's Roger Thornhill, and his performance is not only the crowning glory in one of Hollywood's most storied careers but a performance of a kind I can't imagine any other actor, past or present, being able to give. I had never known, however, until I was diving into the zillion or so hours of special features that came on the Blu-ray, that as the script was in development, Jimmy Stewart wanted ever so badly to play the role. And while his Roger Thornhill wouldn't have been anything like Cary Grant's, I'll bet he would have been fantastic too.

Now, as I approach writing this piece, I'm inclined to guess that with the DWT audience, I'm probably going to be okay with Hitch, Cary, and Jimmy. How about, say, James Mason and Martin Landau, though? How do you talk about the astonishing achievement of North by Northwest without hailing their stunning performances, making such dazzling use of every second of the limited screen time they have, and making their characters' curious relationship if anything more interesting, if less shocking, in 2015 than it was in 1959?


I put this shot of Cary Grant as Roger Thornhill in Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest atop my earlier post about the Museum of the Moving Image's grand celebration of Mad Men, including the Matthew Weiner-selected film series "Required Viewing: Mad Men's Movie Influences." Now I have to wonder, how many readers today will know who Cary Grant and Alfred Hitchcock are?


SAY, JUST WHERE IS ALL THIS "FRAME
OF REFERENCE" STUFF COMING FROM?

Very good question! No, it didn't just come to me spontaneously. It was entirely prompted by the latest piece, in the March 9 New Yorker, in John McPhee's ongoing series of "Writer's Life" pieces reflecting on his occupation as a writer: "Frame of Reference: To illuminate -- or to irritate?"

It's not as if I was unaware of the issue, or didn't have it at least in the back of my head with everything I write or edit. What I have to say I wasn't crediting fully enough is just how pervasive the issue can be for anyone who tries to communicate with fellow humans in any medium. John really had me reeling! And so I'd like to talk a little more about his piece in my 7pm PT/10pm ET post.

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TV and Movie Watch: Celebrating "Mad Men" and Matthew Weiner at MoMI -- and even if you can't get there

Escape from Grand Central: In North by Northwest (made only a couple of years before the dawn of the Age of Mad Men), as Matthew W reminds us, Cary Grant plays an ad man named Roger (seen here trying to slip out of NYC by train; the ticket agent with his bald head to us is that long-enduring character actor Ned Glass). We might add that Hitchcock's ad man named Roger has gotten through life trafficking heavily on his charm.

by Ken

After writing my Sunday Mad Men-themed post, as some readers may have noted from my initial updatings of the "On Demand" CC situation, I proceeded to zoom through Episodes 1-5 of Season 7, and last night I had to restrain myself from watching Episode 7 as well as 6, mostly in the interest of salvaging a bit more sleep than I'd managed Sunday night.

The reason I'm returning to the subject so soon is that time could be a factor for readers within striking range of NYC's Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria (Queens). As you'll see in a moment, there is one more day (Wednesday) left of members-only registration, before sales are thrown open to the general public, for an even that looks to be the biggest deal since that historic night when MoMI had David Chase on hand for a screening of the first and last episodes of The Sopranos, namely:

THE EVENT

Our Matthew on-set with Elisabeth Moss (Peggy Olson)

Screening and Live Event: INSIDE MAD MEN:
A CONVERSATION WITH MATTHEW WEINER
A conversation with Matthew Weiner and a guest moderator (to be announced)

Part of Required Viewing: Mad Men's Movie Influences
Friday, March 20, 7pm

Matthew Weiner, the creator and showrunner of Mad Men, will discuss the influences and inspirations behind the series, talk about his creative and collaborative process, and give a look behind the scenes of the remarkable film series Required Viewing: Mad Men’s Movie Influences. Special guest moderator to be announced.

Tickets: $25 public ($15 members at the Film Lover, Dual, and Family levels / free for Silver Screen members and above).  Members at these levels may reserve tickets in advance.  Tickets will be made available to the public on Thursday, February 26 at 12:00 p.m.

The David Chase extravaganza not only sold out, but sold out a simulcast presentation, with large numbers of Sopranos fans still turned away. And despite the truly tumultuous storm that night, I think everyone left feeling that it had been a glorious, not-to-be-forgotten evening. NYC metro-area Mad Men fans who aren't already members may want to think about joining by tomorrow to assure themselves of members' access to tickets. (Yes, I'm pretty sure you can join and buy your ticket in the same operation.) What's more, members at the "Film Lover" level and above have free access to nearly all of the films (now with online registration access) being screened in the MoMI film series Required Viewing: Mad Men's Movie Influences, as chosen by Matthew Weiner himself -- about which more in a moment.

THE EXHIBITION


That guy standing all by himself way off to the left of the set is literally out of the picture.

As part of its celebration of the culmination of Mad Men, MoMI has an exhibition opening in a couple of weeks which looks to be at least as exciting as the museum's 2013 Breaking Bad exhibition, which I found pretty darned exciting.

Exhibition: MATTHEW WEINER'S MAD MEN

March 14-June 14

This new major exhibition explores the creative process behind Mad Men, one of the most acclaimed television series of all time, now launching its final seven episodes on AMC. Featuring large-scale sets including Don Draper’s office and the kitchen from the Draper’s Ossining home, more than 25 iconic costumes, props, video clips, advertising art, and personal notes and research material from series creator Matthew Weiner, the exhibition offers unique insight into the series’ origins, and how its exceptional storytelling and remarkable attention to period detail resulted in a vivid portrait of an era and the characters who lived through it. The Museum’s exhibition marks the first time objects relating to the production of Mad Men will be shown in public on this scale. The Museum will also present An Evening with Matthew Weiner and a film series featuring movies that inspired the show, selected by Weiner.

The exhibition Matthew Weiner’s Mad Men will be joined by other initiatives around New York City celebrating the series. Mad Men’s final seven episodes will air on AMC on Sundays at 10:00pm ET/PT, from April 5 through May 17. Visit amctv.com for more information. 

Matthew Weiner’s Mad Men is presented with generous support from AMC and Lionsgate.

THE FILM SERIES


Shirley MacLaine and Jack Lemmon in The Apartment, which "completely engaged my imagination as a representation of office and sexual politics at the time" and "blends humor and pathos effortlessly.

Central to MoMI's Mad Men celebration is a mini-festival of films chosen by Matthew Weiner himself as cinematic influences on the show.

With its richness of detail and depth of characterization, Mad Men has an artistic ambition that reveals many influences. Series creator Matthew Weiner drew from literature, cinema, fashion, photography, architecture, music, and more, to help create the world of the show. His goal was not just to give us a realistic depiction of the period, but to delve deeper, to take us into the inner worlds of the show’s characters, into the obsessions, desires, and dreams that lie beneath the surface. For this film series, Weiner has selected ten movies that had an important influence on the creation of Mad Men, movies that made a deep impression on him and were required viewing for people working on the show. The films in this series all played an important role in making Mad Men such a great accomplishment as a narrative of America in the 1960s.

The comments below are all Matthew W's own brief descriptions of how each film influenced him and Mad Men. Note that he'll be presenting The Apartment himself, at a separate event immediately following the "conversation and screening" event on March 20, and for that, everyone has to buy tickets, though MoMI members get a discount. All the other screenings are free for members at the "Film Lover" level and above. Advance reservations can be made online.

"REQUIRED VIEWING: MAD MEN'S MOVIE INFLUENCES"

Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest (1959). Saturday and Sunday, March 14 and 15, 5:30pm)

This film became an important influence on the pilot because it was shot in New York City, right around the time the first episode takes place. While more overtly stylized than we wanted to imitate, we felt the low angles and contemporary feel were a useful reflection of our artistic mindset. I had studied the film in depth at USC film school and absorbed much of its “ordinary man in extraordinary circumstances” narrative drive. It is worth noting that Cary Grant is playing an Adman named Roger, who is forced to assume another man’s identity.

Billy Wilder's The Apartment (1960), with Matthew Weiner in person. Friday, March 20, 9:15pm

I had seen this for the first time in film school and was bowled over by the dynamic writing and the passive nature of its hero, Jack Lemmon’s C.C. Baxter. It is definitely a story of its times, firmly rooted in a Manhattan where seemingly regular men behave unscrupulously, and it completely engaged my imagination as a representation of office and sexual politics at the time. It blends humor and pathos effortlessly.

Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo (1958). Saturday, March 21, 1:30pm, and Sunday, March 22, 4pm

Released to negative reviews, it now ranks for many as the greatest film ever made. I had not seen it before the show began, but finally caught it on a break after the first season. I was overwhelmed with its beauty, mystery, and obsessive detail. I remember watching the camera dolly-in on Kim Novak’s hair and thinking, “this is exactly what we are trying to do.” Vertigo feels like you are watching someone else’s dream.

David Lynch's Blue Velvet (1987). Saturday, March 21, 4pm, and Sunday, March 22, 7pm

Remarkably original for its time, this film had an impact on my generation that can’t be underestimated. I saw it as I was finishing college and applied to film school soon after. Indefinable in genre, Blue Velvet moves from murder mystery to film noir to black comedy to coming-of-age story, almost from scene to scene. With stylistic richness and psychological complexity, it celebrates the horror of the mundane and is filled with reference to a kitschy and ironic “’50s” milieu. This incredible observation informed much of the 1980s and became an inspiration for the series and its attempt to equally revise our mythical perception of the period.

Claude Chabrol's Les bonne femmes (1960). Friday, March 27, 7pm

I first saw this in film school and shared it to help the production design of the pilot because it was shot in the streets of Paris, with little embellishment, at exactly the time we were trying to recreate. The thematic aspects were valuable as well, as the film tells the everyday story of four bored working women led astray by their romantic fantasies. My favorite sequence, a kind of postscript to the whole film, is particularly relevant to the series as it features an unknown woman looking right down the lens at the audience.

Fielder Cook's Patterns (screenplay by Rod Serling, from his 1955 TV version; 1956). Saturday and Sunday, April 4-5, 4pm

I saw this film version as a child on sick day from middle school; it was originally written and produced for live television in 1955. Rod Serling ingeniously creates a boardroom passion play with a chilling first-person climax that I never forgot. We used it often over the life of the series to get a sense of the real offices and to see how virtue and ambition can clash when the older generation is pushed aside and ruthless business confronts humanity.

Delbert Mann's Dear Heart (1964). Saturday and Sunday, April 4 and 5, 7pm

Stumbling upon this film gave me the impetus to finally write the pilot. I was taken by this mainstream Hollywood film that reflected a very casual attitude towards sex, something that seemed uncharacteristic to my preconceptions of the era. With its glib bachelor hero and dowdy, conservative ingénue, it tells a tale of moral corruption and heartbreaking duplicity in the form of a light comedy. As Glenn Ford tries to change his ways and take responsibility for his meaningless romances in glamorous Manhattan, I found a jumping-off point for the series.

Delbert Mann's The Bachelor Party (screenplay by Paddy Chayefsky, from their 1953 TV version; 1957). Saturday, April 11, 4pm

Originally written and produced for live television in 1953, this film reteams writer Paddy Chayefsky and director Delbert Mann, and reflects the painful realism of their previous collaboration, the Oscar-winning film Marty. The “swinging bachelor” was a trope of fiction at this time, but this film poetically undoes the clichés of male camaraderie and presents both the issues of fidelity and loneliness with an unflinching eye.

Jean Negulesco's The Best of Everything (1959). Saturday, April 18, 2pm, and Sunday, April 19, 3:30pm

A highly stylized and star-studded adaptation of Rona Jaffe’s 1958 best-seller, this film became part of the group mind-set for the pilot. Although I felt that it was a visually glamorized, and extremely melodramatic, I could see that its story was a well-observed representation of working women in New York at the time. The workings of the office, the romantic complications, and the living situations all smacked of the truth. Like many popular films of the time, it helped to inform our characters—they certainly would have seen it, and it would have had an impact on their real expectations.

Arthur Hiller's The Americanization of Emily (screenplay by Paddy Chayefsky, 1964). Saturday, April 25, 2pm, and Sunday, April 26, 1pm

I saw this first in film school and was taken immediately with Paddy Chayefsky’s ironic and rhythmic dialogue and by its deep anti-war sentiment, which was shocking because it was rarely discussed in the context of the allies in World War II. James Garner’s portrayal of Charlie, a callow and glib womanizer who has given up on humanity and is then forced into heroism, influenced our attempt to recreate the mid-century male mindset and its relationship to existential absurdity.

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TV Watch: In the "midseason finale" of "Mad Men," Bert Cooper sings and dances!

"One man may seem incompetent, another not make sense,
while others look like quite a waste of company expense.
They need a brother's leadership, so please don't do them in.
Remember, mediocrity is not a mortal sin."

-- J. Pierrepont Finch (Robert Morse), in How
to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying

by Ken

Okay, so it wasn't "Brotherhood of Man." (Composer-lyricist Frank Loesser, wherever you are, would you please stand up and take a quick bow?) It was still special.

"The Best Things in Life Are Free," sings Bert.

I don't feel at liberty to go into the detail of Bert's song and dance, so as to avoid piling on spoilers for people who haven't yet watched last night's Mad Men "midseason finale." And think on that a moment: a "midseason finale." We all know that this was the last of the seven episodes that make up "the first half" of Season 7, with the remaining seven episodes, the "second half" of the season, promised for . . . well, 2015. Actually, since Mad Men has been doing 13-episode seasons, the two halves of Season 7 really do add up to a single season, more or less -- but a two-year "season"?

Anyway, in order to steer clear of further spoilers, I'm not going to go into the circumstances of Bert's rendering of "The Best Things in Life Are Free." But let's face it, isn't this what we've been waiting for ever since we met Mad Men's advertising éminence grise? A song, a dance, maybe a full-fledged production number?

I tried to figure a way to get in a picture that includes a pair
of Bert's trademark socks. We can't get everything we want.
(Wait! Look at the "Best Things in Life Are Free" shot above.)

I was happy to be caught up with Season 7 in time for last night's "finale." As I believe I've mentioned, my re-viewing of the first six seasons of Mad Men was interrupted partway through Season 6 by an unexpected televisual hijacking. I started watching the DVDs of Gilmore Girls, a show I'd never paid any attention to, figuring that esconced on the WB it must be a show for teenage girls. But within a couple of episodes I found it taking over my life, and I hardly came up for air until I'd downed all 153 episodes spread over seven seasons (which ended in 2007).

Then, thinking it might be interesting to look again at the first episode or two, I did that, and quickly knew there was no point fighting it. There was no possibility of stopping until I reached Episode 153 again. At least in theory, a test I used to apply to possible DVD acquisitions was whether I could count on watching them more than once. In fact, especially during my recent DVD (and Blu-ray) acquiring binge, I've stockpiled a huge quantity of stuff I have yet to watch even once. Gilmore Girls has already passed its two-viewings mark, and I realize I'm in constant peril of stumbling into viewing no. 3.

(For some time now I've had a future post called "A love letter to Gilmore Girls creator Amy Sherman-Palladino" in "draft" status atop the DWT working-posts list, which I expect has been driving Howie just the least bit crazy, though by now he's familiar with the phenomenon of posts that, over a long period, I aim to write, and sometimes eventually do.)


From Season 3, Episode 7, "Seven Twenty Three": "Would you say I know something about you, Don?" asks Bert, who of course knows most of the terriblest thing there is to know about Don.


HAPPILY, THE DVR DID ITS JOB WITH MAD MEN

So by the time I polished off Gilmore Girls 153 the second time, I was able to go back to the start of Season 6 of Mad Men, then zip right through Episodes 1-6 of Season 7. Or should I say zap my way through Season 7? After going through the 78 episodes of Seasons 1-6 blissfully commercial-free, I experienced quite a jolt returning to the real world of basic cable. I went so far as to watch last night's episode in real time, with unzappable commercial breaks!

And the almost-immersive viewing of the 85 Mad Men episodes to date has been an invaluable experience. I was stunned by how much I didn't remember, or remember completely, and how much I probably never really grasped the first time through, for all sorts of reasons. One obvious reason is that preknowledge of the characters made it a lot easier to sort out developments as they developed, and to appreciate how carefully they were developed, and consequently to follow all sorts of plot lines more accurately than before.

One thing that intrigued me is that the progress of the series no longer seemed to me the steadily downward, darkening movement it had seemed taken in season by season. Mostly it seems to me that the first time through, we just knew less about the characters. The second time through, for example, the marriage of Don and Betty Draper (Jon Hamm and January Jones) seems clearly doomed almost from the time we meet them. And the second time through, what had seemed so clearly a descent into meltdown on Don's part didn't seem to me any such thing, really. Yes, some of the pieces of his puzzle were rearranging themselves -- for him as well as us. But even his supposed hitting of bottom, in the famous Hershey's presentation, where he actually tells a true story from his early life, is not just an instance of truth-telling (albeit under not ideally appropriate circumstances) but an act that enables the even-more-desperate-to-get-away Ted Chaough (Kevin Rahm) to have the suddenly and improbably coveted Los Angeles job.


THE ULTIMATE SIN: NOT FITTING IN

Who picked out Harry's glasses?

Here I have to give series mastermind Matthew Weiner all kinds of credit for the direction(s) he has chosen to take Mad Men so far in the final season. I know a lot of people have been expecting Don to have to pay for the past sins of his we learned about gradually in the early seasons. Now in fact he is being undone by what appear to be much more serious sins -- not just telling the truth, but not fitting in. Weiner and his team have given us two characters in particular who live by the crucial importance of fitting in: Harry Hamlin in his creepily empty-suited performance as Jim Cutler (the first "C" of CGC, the agency with which SCDP merged so suddenly and unexpectedly in Season 6 that it was ages before the new agency even got a name; whoever picked out those glasses for Jim should get an Emmy just for that), and Allan Havey giving a performance that somehow manages to be simultaneously vaguely comical and understatedly savage as Lou Avery, Don's singularly uncreative SCP replacement as creative director during his forced "leave."

It's not until after Don has attempted his comeback that all-knowing Bert Cooper points out, exasperatedly, that no one comes back from leave. And when someone has committed a sin like Don's, the sin of not fitting in, he should surely know that any future he may have should be someplace else.




UPDATE: TO SEE AND HEAR BERT SING AND
DANCE, CHECK OUT THIS FOLLOW-UP POST

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Revisiting "The Sopranos" -- the final season looks better than ever

The famously (and deliberately) enigmatic final scene of The Sopranos, as the Soprano family arrives one by one -- or nearly, since Meadow doesn't quite make it inside -- at the agreed-upon dinner site, Holsten's

by Ken

Thanks to the miracle of "On Demand," I've been taking a riveting trip through the "final season" (really two not-quite-full seasons) of The Sopranos, from 2006-07, which HBO has been posting in blocs of four episodes -- three for the 12-episode Season "6A" and two for the 9-episode Season "6B," with those final five episodes appearing in time for this weekend, when I devoured them rapaciously.

I don't have anything startling or, really, new to say about the show. There is, perhaps, the obvious question to answer: How does the show hold up? And the answer is: It looks better than ever. Now that it's no longer necessary to focus on the progress of the assorted plot lines, it's easier to focus on the stunning precision of detail, and how brilliantly creator and master producer David Chase's extraordinary team of writer-producers -- developed and mined the roster of characters created in the earlier seasons. This is still something that top-quality TV-makers can do which can't be done in any other medium, and while Chase certainly didn't invent it, he brought it to a level that I don't think anyone else has matched.

David Chase had done brilliant work as a writer and producer on The Rockford Files, I'll Fly Away, and Northern Exposure, but The Sopranos was his own creation, for which as overseer he also assembled the amazing team.

In the Season 6-es we see the full development of Tony Sopranos monstrousness, but we also see a renewal of the fascinating relationship between the Soprano children -- such different people (Meadow who fails at hardly anything she tries, Anthony Jr. who tries hardly anything and usually screws up what he does) and yet still bound by that special closeness of siblings, at least on Mead's part. There's so much more that I wouldn't know where to begin.

A re-viewing naturally also makes it possible to appreciate in greater depth and astonishment the work of the entire huge cast and of all the behind-the camera people, not to mention the corps of directors. And in some way I'm most awed by the size of the team Chase assembled -- so many amazing writers, directors, actors, and all the categories of technical people, all producing work of such uniform terrificness.

As for the legacy of The Sopranos, the Season 6-es continue to showcase the work of one of the series' mainstay writers, Terence Writer, now the driving creative force behind HBO's terrific Boardwalk Empire, and even more the work of future Mad Men creator Matthew Weiner, who had emerged as a Sopranos writing force in Season 5 and now, a full-fledged executive producer, emerges as the most important single writer.

Next I guess I'm going to have to go through the whole series, an undertaking complicated by the fact that I have the first few seasons on VHS. (I was a late convert to DVD.) The nice part is that I have a feeling the show is going to continue looking better and better.


It never occurred to me to check it out, so I only just realized that Holsten's is an actual restaurant, in Bloomfield, NJ.

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