- Don and Megan take a trip to Hawaii for the holidays, Sally's friend visits the Francis family, a comedian torpedoes Peggy's Super Bowl ad campaign, and Roger gets some bad news about his mother.
- It's December 1967 and Don is in Hawaii with Meagan on a working holiday. They're staying at the Royal Hawaiian hotel, a client, so that Don can get an idea of what it's like for their new ad campaign. He has an interesting encounter with an army private currently serving in Vietnam but on leave to get married. He has a proposition for Don. They return home to finds their doorman, who had a serious heart attack standing in front of them, on the job. Megan is concerned that her employers may be diminishing her TV role. At the office, the firm has expanded to include the floor above but Don is not too happy to find that his office furniture has been rearranged. Roger Sterling learns that his mother has died. Betty takes a motherly interest in Sally's friend Sandy who lives next door and whose mother died recently. Sandy has an adventurous streak that Betty perhaps wishes she had at her age. At her new employer, Peggy Olson faces something of a crisis when recent news may force her to redo an entire campaign.—garykmcd
- It's the Christmas holiday season, but the war in Vietnam pervades much of what is going on in life. Don and Megan are in Waikiki on a business trip as they stay at the Royal Hawaiian on the bequest of SCDP's new client, Sheraton. Don doesn't know how to convey the experience he felt while being in Hawaii and at the hotel to the creative team, which includes a chance war related encounter he has in the hotel bar. Megan, while she enjoys her time away, is more concerned about what that absence means for her budding acting career on the soap opera, "To Have and to Hold". Their arrival home includes strengthening their friendship with another couple in their building, the Rosens, who they recently only met in what was potentially a tragic situation. Don also comes back to much activity at the office, including a employee in accounts who will do whatever it takes to get noticed by the head honchos. At CGC, Peggy is having her own work woes as a war related comedy monologue on a late night television show threatens her just launched campaign for Koss, that launch which will peak with a Super Bowl commercial. Peggy has to decide how to do damage control with the client, especially concerning the television commercial. The Francises host Sally's fifteen year old friend, Sandy, a budding violinist who will soon be off to Julliard. Betty learns some information about Sandy, with who she bonds as she sees much of herself at that age in Sandy. And Roger, who is deep in therapy, receives some tragic news, about which he seems unaffected.—Huggo
- "Mad Men" - "The Doorway" - April 7, 2013
And we're back!
We open on a man giving another man CPR.
Then we cut to Megan and Don on the beach in Hawaii. Megan is looking hot and Don is reading "Dante's Inferno."
It turns out that they are in paradise because Don is meeting with the head of a hotel to work up ideas for their ad campaign. While they were there several things happened.
Megan and Don experienced the joys of sex while high. Megan, who is now on a soap opera playing a character named Corinne, was recognized by another hotel patron and fawned over and asked for an autograph. Megan also got up to dance the hula.
Late one night, Don also met a private on leave from the Vietnam war getting very drunk at the bar. Dinkins notices that he and Don have the same lighter, meaning they were both in the service. (It's the kind the army gives out.) Dinkins is getting married in the a.m. because his intended read that married service men tend to survive since they have something to live for. He asks Don to give away the bride. He says one day he'll pay it forward when he is an older man and meets a young GI. When Megan awakes in the morning, Don is gone. She heads down to the beach and sees him standing up for Dinkins and snaps a photo.
Back in Rye, Sally, her friend Sandy, Betty, and the senior Mrs. Francis head out to see the Nutcracker. On the way home Betty gets a ticket for reckless driving. Mrs. Francis tries to drop Henry's name to get out of the ticket but it doesn't work. Sally rats Betty out to Henry when they get home and Mrs. Francis explains that Henry can fix the ticket. He says he fixes them by paying them. Sandy is a talented violinist and obliges the Francis family request to get up and perform a song for them. She's quite good and says that although she's only 15 she will be going to Juilliard.
We cut back to the opening scene. It turns out that before they left for their trip. Jonesy, the Drapers' door man had a heart attack right as they were coming home from dinner with another couple from the building, the Rosens, a doctor and his wife. Rosen saved his life. When Don and Megan return the doorman is back at his post and very grateful. Jonesy hands Megan her new script.
Later that night in the Francis home, Henry and Betty have a strange conversation about Sandy. She insinuates that Henry wants to sleep with her and talks about holding her arms down while Henry rapes her after sticking a rag in her mouth. It is bizarre.
Later that night Betty bumps into Sandy in the kitchen. They share some peanut butter and crackers even though Betty complains she's trying to "reduce." Sandy admits to Betty that she didn't get in to Juilliard. She talks about how she went down to the village and loved the energy there, the people, the bohemians, the squatters, and thought it was 'beautiful' etc. Betty tells her to try again next year and say she wanted to finish high school. Sandy says all she wanted to do was go to New York. Betty contends that plenty of people do fine without Juilliard. Sandy complains that she'll just end up married and bored in the suburbs...like Betty. Betty tries to buck her up and says she's talented and she can manage another two years of high school.
At Don and Megan's, Megan has gone through the script and discovers she only has one scene and is worried taking a vacation hurt her in the eyes of the writers/producers.
Peggy gets a late night call from her boss Burt Peterson. He's worried that an ad campaign of theirs is screwed now because of a comic's jokes on the Tonight Show. The client is Koss headphones and they want to pull their Superbowl ad which is very bad news. He says she needs to call the big boss Ted Chaough.
The next morning Don runs into Dr. Rosen and invites him over to the firm to give him a Leica camera. They're a client and he has a closet full. Don says if he comes by his office, Don gets to see Rosen work in surgery.
Roger Sterling is in analysis. He's musing on life, women, analysis itself. He complains that no one in the office really knows him. He cracks a joke but the doctor doesn't laugh, saying he can't laugh at everything. Roger talks about the doors and bridges in life and that he's realized that all the doors open the same way and they all close behind you and they're supposed to change you and it turns out it isn't true and you're just going in a straight line to hell. He's also annoyed about New Year's.
Back in the office, Peggy, Peterson and another employee Lawrence talk about the comic's routine. He apparently told jokes about soldiers cutting off the ears of the Viet Cong and making them into a necklace. Their tagline for Koss headphones is "Lend me your ears." She tells Peterson that she hasn't reached Ted. She just wants to tell Koss, "No." Peterson tells her to work it out.
In the elevator Don bumps into Bob Benson who works on another floor in accounts, what he calls "the outfield." He's basically just a big fan of Don's and wants to get to know him and offers him tickets to the Cotton Bowl.
Don heads into "creative" room and says he smells "creativity." He chats with Stan and Ginsberg. There is also an older woman at the table and they mock her. Stan asks for some info to get working on the pitch for the Royal Hawaiian. Don tells them that he "had an experience" and he doesn't know how to put it into words for them.
He walks out and sees a full photo shoot happening. They're taking portraits of the partners. Pete poses and then it's Joan's turn. Dawn has scheduled Don's shoot for later in the day in his office, which the photographers have rearranged to their liking. Don, however, does not care for it. Pete asks Don about whether he has anything for him to help with the account. He doesn't. He heads into his office and stares out the window.
Peggy meets with the Koss headphones guy and says he doesn't think anyone else has made this connection and it's in the Koss guy's head. He pushes back saying he knows they can't pull the TV ad but has a solution that isn't quite right. He wants to cut the Shakespeare line but Peggy says it neuters the joke and she'll figure out how to turn that solution into a great ad. She asks for a couple of days. He agrees.
Don and his team work on an ad for a Dow presentation. All the ads have love in them and he wants to take the word "love" out of the kitchen. They're wearing out the word love and he wants to offer an electric jolt when it comes to that word. Rosen shows up for his camera. Don appears to have a man crush on the surgeon and his power and invites him to lunch. The doctor demurs but says their wives are cooking something up for New Year's Eve. Dawn comes to tell him the photographers are ready.
Roger is chatting with a woman on the phone and Caroline comes in and tearfully tells him that his mother has died. Apparently, Caroline loved her and thought she was very nice. Roger says she was 91 and it was hardly a shock. He tells her to tell Joan who will know what to do. Roger raises his glass to the ceiling to his mom and says, "Cheers."
Peggy tries to reach Ted who apparently is at some kind of Christian retreat with his wife. The pastor who answers the phone doesn't want to disturb him.
In his office Don preps for the photographers and asks what he should do. The photographer says he wants to see him "lost in confident thought." He lights a cigarette and realizes that he accidentally picked up PFC Dinkins' lighter instead of his own. He does actually lose himself in thought looking at it. He asks the photographer again what he wants and he replies, "I want you to be yourself."
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