Hi, carousel and welcome to our lively bunch of Mad Men fanatics! We are all going berzerk here in the US waiting for our Mad Men fix in July. You definitely have my sympathy in having to wait even longer for the new season. As to your questions...I believe the smoking will become less because I think Bert will finally make his wishes known (he doesn't allow smoking in his office already) that he wants SC to become smoke free. He is one who is ahead of his time in his thinking, anyway. As for Peggy, I believe she will give her son (mini Pete?) up for adoption (hopefully to the Campbells who will not know until later on that it is actually Pete's real son--if it is that is) Again, welcome to our group of MM fans!

Mad Men in the UK is shown on a digital only channel called
BBC4 - specialist channel, smaller audiences .
However for a month before season 1 started with us in January they started trailing the series with teases.
The Weiner Sopranos connection was heavily flagged.
I thought, interesting: advertising with guns, killing and swearing - that's different!

1960 is an interesting year to chose because by the end of the decade nothing looked, felt or seemed the same in the US or UK or the world for that matter, (that's what it says in the books I've read).

So much to sell, so little time.

I don't think you can do without the smoking in the show -- it's so iconic, just look at the logo! A lot changes in two years, but it took decades for smoking to become as taboo as it is now. People will continue to smoke despite what Bert Cooper desires, because, as Pete says, "You still have to get where you're going" ;)

I wasn't calling for a smoking cessation !! Of course it's integral to the show and the real people of 1960.

Think of my question as nothing more than tongue in cheek and as a way of saying hello to others who love and respect Mad Men like I do.

Just a comment that Clayton Neuman's post above made me recall. Wasn't it hilarious when the Lucky Strike folks were all lighting up ("Smoke Gets in Your Eyes") and so were the SC guys and when they started coughing the SC guys joined right in coughing as well? Seen the new commercial ("Tobacco Stops With Me") showing the mom coughing her head off and then lighting right up as she grabs the remote to click off of an anti-smoking ad! I guess you can tell I'm anti-smoking (my mom died of lung cancer after smoking for 50 years) Don't want to start a campaign here, but I don't think we've come all that long a way when it comes smokers who are still in denial about the dangers.

The smoking will more than likely stay. They may limit it to certain scenes. You can change the decor, change how people dress, talk, what they drive, what music they are listening to etc. One thing that is so very noticable is the open smoking and drinking in the office. That was allowed. So to enable the show to depict how the times were and any of the vises that are not permitted in the work place today are shown. As for Peggy she has a career on her mind. When the doctor told her she was going to have a baby, she said "That's impossible!" I really think when she went for her birth control pills that she throught they were going to work right away. However I think also think that she was allready, PG. @ Carousel, you were spot on about the world not being or looking the same after the 60's. Like I've said before those years were the jumping off point to a whole new world. Like it(Beatlemania,hippies,mini skirts,free love, drop in & drop out, be cool man,flower power Etc. ) or not.
Rock on Madmen groupies

I agree with you 100% about Peggy and contraception, she was a very early uptaker,Patricia .
Regarding chnge, you only have to look in Vogue to see evidence of the revolutionary changes that took place in women's fashions over a very short period. The whole look changed from the formal to the free functional.
I'm using UK Vogue as my research source, by the way.
The way hair, make up, attitude all changed so quickly.. The difference between 1960 and 1966 is completely breathtaking. A different looking and feeling world. The era of Swinging London (gone by 1967 - the world turned its eyes to the US West Coast) New man made fibres bringing high fashion within reach of so many more people.
Certainly in the UK, the austerity of post 2nd World War UK was finally cast-off
People with money were set free. - were given choices.
Btw, Peggy's favourite hat - did she inherit it from an aged relative? :0)

I just hope it turns out to be right that the "herbal cigarettes" are and continue to be "harmless"...wonder what "herb" they are made from? "hemp"?? Funny how that stuff is illegal when smoked and fine when toiletries, fabric, etc. is made from it! LOL

If MM writers stay true to the 1960's era....Yes, we will still have lots of smoking and drinking on MM episodes this next season!! I think many young people are wondering, "do they do anything else but drink and smoke?". The older generation will answer, "yes, that was all they did in the 60's". Despite our 2000 views of smoking and drinking at the workplace, we can't ignore or change history. Yes, women will still struggle in the workplace (no, Peggy will not be promoted) . The "good ol' boys network" will make sure the women in the office find it easier to stay at home. I am sure the MM writers don't like showing women's sufferage, racism, discrimination and health hazards like smoking. But it would be unjust and unfair to those who suffered through those times to make it appear something it was not. MM writers are not about making the show edgy or insensitive, it is about making sure people see history as it really was, not something brushed over in books. TV can send the message in a visual that history books can't seem to reach. We have to remember how bad it was in order for history to not be repeated. Women and minorities have come too far.

Don't limit the smoking. For this series it is essential. Smoking at that time was a right of passage. It was an adult thing. It also carried with it the connotation of being able to do adult things like drink and sex. It lent an air of sophistication to the person doing it.

If your parents allowed you to (or silently recognized that you did) smoke, they gave you a tacit approval of growing up. Young adults looked forward to being able to smoke.

Smoking for those who did it is/was something to do with your hands, something to relieve boredom. It provided time to think to phrase an answer. Truth is, it was the cool and adventurous who smoked. Health had little or nothing to do subconsciously with why someone did or did not smoke. In fact, it was thought to settle the stomach and like a martini enable one to relax. The women who did were not breaking new ground but they were making a statement. They weren't "bad", but certainly not so awfully proper either. In the South especially and small towns everywhere smoking was an art and carrying (never in public) and where you smoked said a lot about you. Lighting up was always to be from the hand and not the mouth. In many instances gloves were mandatory when smoking. Smoking was a 1950s and 1960s ritual and the show ought not to waver from the time. I appreciate the "feel" of the smoke filled sets, it truly is essential to the era.

They need to smoke1
It's Madison Avue in the sixties and Joan looks great smoking!
I am her biggest fan.

keep it real. If smoking were to bow down to PC concerns and be reduced in Season 2 it would be revisionist and similar to watching reruns of say, Happy Days - made in the '70s but set in the '50s but the cast all had freakishly (by '50s norms) long '70s feathered hair by the end. Or reruns of Gunsmoke when men of the scruffy wild west apparently wore Dacron/polyester slacks!

Thanks to TV-LAND reruns for the perspective!

As the member who originally posed this tongue in cheek question, I notice that authenticity is the big pitch from responders..

I wonder what the cast feel about it - if they feel anything at all?
They are after all pursuing their art and for that sacrifices sometimes have to be made, smoke even if they don't, passive smoking etc (and pay cheques cashed which may focus the mind).
Any insurance implications for the cast and producers?

(I smoke so I'm not in a PC zone on this issue).

The cigarettes are herbal, but I assume that the physical sacrifice the actors have to make is nonetheless significant. EW did a video interview with John Slattery where he said he wished his character would go to rehab, because he can't handle any more herbal cigarettes or water martinis ;)

Thanks for a valuable insight. There are of course herbal cigarettes and there are herbal cigarettes....

How much will the series 1 DVD cost in the States? In the UK, we'll have to pay $36.

Carousel, the DVD in the US will cost about $39 I think.

I agree with most on here regarding the smoking. It has to stay in the show. It is part of the culture back then. Living in our PC society now, it's a good look at how things were when I grew up. I think of the party at Betty and Draper's house when the pregnant neighbor was smoking and drinking. That is how things were back then. I bet they even had trans fats in the snacks they served at the party LOL. Nowadays everything has to be dictated to society as being so safe and healthy. Back then it seemed like people just lived their lives and didn't worry about "Will that harm me?".

Not only did everyone smoke in public areas, there were also cigarettes and liquor commercials on TV. I noticed that liquor commercials are making a come back, but only with tons of disclaimers in and around it telling people to drink responsibily. If you remember the "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes" episode, many of the characters said they felt better knowing their doctor smoked. If doctors do it then it must be okay. We are still in that mind set today. There are so many dangerous things out there (check out what they place in vaccines and the controversy behind them) that people continue to do whatever their doctors tell them to do. Could you imagine what people in the 1960's would have thought about our anti-smoking commercials today!! All the people who thought smoking was bad for you were considered jealous crack pots. It took 15 years for the doctors to say, "hey, maybe smoking might be bad for you after all"....duh!! Sometimes the crack pots do get it right. Unfortunately, it takes us years for us to believe the research, choke it down and change.

Puff, choke, gag. It's hard even to remember what that smell was like. A grey carbon monoxide reek that clung to rugs and hair and clothing. And the stinking ash trays in public places, emitting a toxic reek worse than the bottom of a garbage can. Yet smoking was deemed sexy for decades, i.e. Bette Davis blowing smoke in Paul Henreid's face in Now, Voyager. It was all part of the cachet of sexiness and power.

Then again, spitting in public was perfectly acceptible until tuberculosis outbreaks made it unsafe. Spittoons were strategically placed so that men could spew their gobs of brown saliva at them, and I don't suppose they were cleaned out until they were full. God knows what it was like if you knocked one over, or got one caught on your foot.

The smoking in Mad Men is completely appropriate to the era and should continue. But what about contemporary actors/actresses who puff away, as if smoking still has some vestige of glamor left in it? Are they demonstrating a kind of twisted toughness, or do they just prefer stinking breath and hair and phlegm-choked lungs, not to mention the threat of premature death?

Oh, Carousel, the smoking would have to stay! Everyone smoked and drank because it let off steam. Or to get warmed up for sex. And drugs (pills, LSD, marijuana) still hadn't become the mainstream alternative to that yet until '67-68.

Smoking wasn't thought of as bad yet. I don't know if medicine even connected smoking with heart disease until the mid-60s (my dad had his first heart attack in 1967). Let alone your diet!

When I started working (mid 70s), there was always smoking in offices and at your desk! (I wasn't even a smoker then - succumbed to it much later unfortunately). Even I can't believe it now in hindsight. At the paper, people would be typing away (sometimes ad copy catching fire by accident), smoking in elevators or putting them out on the wall next to the elevator button or anywhere in the building. Smoking in the office wasn't banned until 1990. Welcome to the West Coast!

Remember the ROBERT JOHNSON commemorative stamp issued by USPS several years ago? They airbrushed the cigarette out of the photograph.

Eric, I'll show my ignorance - who was Robert Johnson? What a crack up tho, to not have the cigarette in - that'd be like showing a photo of Edward R. Murrow without a cigarette!

...ground-breaking blues guitarist from the '30s- people like Eric Clapton and Led Zeppelin covered his songs .

the story:
http://www.photobooth.net/mt/archives/2005/03/24/robert_johnson_photobooth_controversy.php

JAMM54 , I so know what you mean. When I worked for a county Probate Court in Massachusetts in the late 1980's we were allowed to smoke at our desks. I didn't work in the courtroom but in an office.
I can also remember watching an old movie from the 1950's or 60's and the main character goes into a movie theater, takes a seat and lights a cigarette. That is why Madmen is so accurate because it's just what people did, they smoked, they drank and drove, they even gave their kids spankings when they were bad. It was part of 1960s reality.

LFWH, yeah, it all was part of everyday living. It's hard to describe to anyone not growing up then that no one even gave it a second thought. Then, people weren't so busy policing themselves about their habits or even thinking of that - you just worked, lived, and went home. Now, it seems like we're so busy judging/disapproving of ourselves, it's become almost puritanical that we be "perfect". Well, people are just plain flawed! They try, but.....

ERICCOOLEY: I looked Robert Johnson up on USPS, and read about him. Didn't know Eric Clapton had covered his songs (whom I absolutely love - could listen to his guitar playing forever, and lucky enough to catch him in concert with Muddy Waters and Annie Lennox once).

JAMM54, that is exactly how I feel too. Society tries to be perfect and try to make everything perfect that they judge anything or anyone with flaws. That is why I like this show so much. The flaws are out in the open for everyone to see.

LFWH, yeah maybe that's why we're all so grumpy and irritable (road rage anyone?) these days. Why I think reality shows have become so popular - see people humiliated, treated cruelly to vent those feelings.

Who wouldn't feel crummny? We're always failing now at everything (too fat, too thin, smoker/non-smoker, vegetarian/meat eater, career ambitious/blue collar, etc, etc, etc).

About the only thing expected of us when I was growing up was to get a job (any), marry, have kids, buy a house, just live, and then retire. Really sounds simplistic, doesn't it?

Anything else was an extra. And we really didn't spend time looking at what was "wrong" with ourselves. But, maybe it's the evolution of the multitude of options and the complexities of those choices, that have made life so, so different than 48 years ago! That's almost half a century! I didn't realize that!

Anobody notice the "LINKMAN" ad in the upper right corner of this page? Talk about perfect placement for advertising! LOL

For the uninitiated in the UK, what/who is LINKMAN?

It was an ad for a stop smoking gadget! I never saw or heard of it either (here in the USA) before I saw that ad! It looked like a stainless steel (?)cigarette. Probably one of those things that smells and tastes so bad it makes people trying to quit nauseous and they lose the urge to smoke. It just caught my eye being on the page here about all the smoking on MM.

well, I'm doing my o w n research...

Well, I went on their site and LINKMAN is some kind of expensive. I think if I was a smoker and had not tried the gum, patch,etc. I would definitely try those first! It looks to be a little timer thing that "tells" you when you can smoke and gradually weans you off smoking. Oh well, I guess if I had "tried it all" and saw that and I was desperate--I tried smoking in college, (crappy old menthol "Kools")-- and somehow I never got hooked (glad) but I can feel for folks who do have that problem. I hope that MM doesn't glamorize smoking so much that we have more people getting hooked than ever, but, it probably will...

MM is beautifully lit and photographed. It looks cinematic not televisual. In this environment Don Draper's ritual of lighting his cigarette in a certain way is fascinating. - His whole being is making a point - I'm going to enjoy this cigarette.

The level of smoking is not really the issue in MM.

In MM smoking just looks so damn COOL. Saying as much about the individual as their choice of clothes, hairstyle, car.

Is not smoking in MM cool?

Ever seen a good photo of a smoke-free jazz club at 3 a.m.?

I know MM had to teach many of their actors how to smoke, which seems so ironic in our health concience lifestyles. I wonder if they put in the cast call that they preferred actors who smoke. Many of the cast members who had to be taught how to smoke say that they wish their character would go to rehab because they are tired of smoking herbal cigarettes and drinking water martinis. Can you imagine how great it would be on the set for those actors who smoke? They would never have to wait for a "smoke break". The whole day would be one giant smoke break!! I know a couple of friends who wish they could smoke at work like they did in the 60's. It is probably some of those people who would love to go back to the 60's and enjoy the smoking freedom. I never smoked, but married a man who did smoke. I thought it looked so sexy and I it could have been a reason I was attracted to him. I got used to the smoking in the house, car, etc. and never complained. After I divorced him and unpacked several boxes months later, I realized how much smoke smell was on all of my stuff. By the time I started dating again, smoking was done outside and away from other people. In the end I dated only men who did not smoke because I never forgot the smell of those cigarettes on my stuff. I am married to a man who doesn't smoke, drink or drink coffee. As a devoted coffee drinker I feel like drinking coffee around those who do not is like smoking cigarettes. Starbucks makes drinking coffee as glamourous as smoking cigarettes. We just head down to the coffee house and have the same conversations as Mad Men do in their homes and offices as we wrap our hands around a hot, steamy latte.

You are so right, carousel, smoking DOES look cool...that's part of the trouble...people want to look cool and start smoking then get hooked. I agree with all you said, including that MM looks like a mini movie every week. I love the "look" of meticulous "class" in everything about it. Oh, and luvmadmen, the difference in coffee drinking and smoking is that the coffee doesn't get in every pair of lungs around the coffee drinker. I am anti-smoking like you...couldn't resist the comment...not to mention the cost of both a Starbucks habit and a smoking habit...through the roof!

Coffee isn't that innocent, people. Ever tried getting a coffee stain out of a light carpet? Or your teeth?
Or that coffee growers don't get the monetary reward that they should from rip-off corporations - Fair Trade etc.
We English drink tea, don't you know and we're proud of it!
Smoking isn't inherently evil. It's just that human beings have this ability to become addicted to just about anything on the planet
It's struck me that if being a conscious, sentient being is so wonderful in itself, why would humans try so hard to bend it out of shape in order to escape it through extraneous substances and experiences?

Some of the above is tongue in cheek, by the way.

Say there, carousel, a lot of us in the colonies love tea, too---and it's healthy--at least this year! (Unlike coffee which alternates between being good for you and lethal!) To change the subject---I think we need to start bashing all the drinking on MM...there's just as much of that as there is smoking if not more! (tongue in cheek also) Oh, and the bed hopping, don't forget! Let's face it, anything taken to excess is a guilty pleasure!

Totally right scfan !!
Drinking is in the sin bin.
So is their diet - too much fatty food.
No excercise (except for bed hopping).
Not showing emotions - we can nail them for that and how its scrambled the heads of future generations.
Cars that drank enough petrol (gas) to kill the ozone layer in half an hour.
We can say this because we are all saints! Just off to buff my halo.

You said it, carousel, and another thing...I hope that in Season 2 Roger (so scared by his recent heart attack) becomes more of a health freak than Bert! I think it would be fun if he did a complete turnaround and went around preaching to everyone within earshot that they should stop drinking and smoking so as not to end up like him (bed hopping is exempt because he can't give that up!) and he alienates all the clients so much that he is barred from the meetings! Remember when Larry Hagman ("I Dream of Jeannie"/ "Dallas") stopped smoking after a lifetime of it, became a spokesman for the American Lung Association (or some such) and went around with a little battery powered fan shoving it in the faces of anyone who dared to light up in his presence? He said (and it is so true) "There's no one more anti-smoking than an ex smoker!" Roger is just the type to do such as that!

Do we really know that Roger had a heart attack? He kept mentioning that his ulcer was always acting up and was drinking milk and vodka (what a remedy,huh?) to calm it down. Sometimes people get indigestion so bad that feels like they are having a heart attack. Remember Michael Douglas' heart attack (indigestion) in War of the Roses? Wouldn't it be great if Roger's heart attack was really indigestion instead? Don and Bert would be pretty bummed out. They have Roger pushed half way out the door as it is, only Roger doesn't know it. You can tell they are just waiting for some kind of health issue to get Roger's signature on an early retirement. Bert is a pretty smooth executive and would never fire Roger. SC will always be "the old boys network" and loyalty to fellow partners runs thick. However, he would push Roger's buttons until he resigns.
As for their diet and exercise on MM - fatty foods and no exercise never seemed to create over weight people back then. Go to the schools today and look at all the over weight kids. I remember maybe one or two over weight kids in my class. Now the majority are over weight and you only see one or two skinny kids. Look back at old photos of people in the 60's and you find the majority are thin. For eating so much fatty foods and not exercising, they all seemed to be thin and fit. Maybe it is not the fat in the food, but the growth hormones in ours that is causing our obese society? Maybe someday we will have research tell us lard really is our friend and pumped up beef and chicken are our worst enemies. LOL And by the way carousel, doesn't tea have more caffeine than coffee stain your teeth just as bad? Go polish your halo again, it just fell.

luvmadmen. It was stated that Roger had a heart attack.

As for tea having more caffeine than coffee,that all depends which blend you drink , or if its decaff.
The remarks about coffee were totally tongue in cheek.

Falling halos? No
And no intentional hint of holier than thou,either.

Back to smoking. I think Betty is the most unconvincing smoker on MM. She just doesn't do it like she means it.
Cigarettes seem to look very alien and awkward on her.
It just doesn't suit her
Just a thought.

Isn't Roger coming back in Season 2?

Life; it's a Mad Men thing.

Hey there, luvmadmen, we were just joshin'! When the tea stains begin to show, just use them newfangled whitening strips...coffee, tea, cigarettes, cigars, blueberies, they all stain. Isn't it funny how all the smokers on MM have blindingly white teeth? What did they do back then, brush their teeth with Clorox? LOL

Ok, ok...just feeling a need to help ease the pain of so many Starbucks closing these days. :o( I'll keep in mind the tongue in cheek. :o)
I do agree with you about Betty being the most unconvincing of all the women smokers. She holds the cigarette so awkward, like she just learned how to smoke. The rest of the women on the show seem to be more convincing. However, I still have this weird feeling about Roger's heart attack. I am wondering if they will show Roger being told to not be bed hopping so much to avoid another heart attack. He is so distraught that he seeks another doctor that will tell him he is fine. He then decides to celebrate with a night with Joan at the Plaza Hotel and - BAM!! He has a heart attack AND gets caught red-handed (no pun intended) with Joan. Joan gets the shun from the office ladies as she goes from being the "bell of the ball" to the ultimate "sleezy home wrecker". Wouldn't Peggy have some fun with that situation? Women were vicious to home wreckers back in the 60's. Here's another thought - the ladies at the office start going to Peggy for advice instead of Joan and Joan's quest to gain her power back really gets MM going!! Nothing like good ol' corporate back stabbing by women to keep us tuned in.

luvmadmen: welcome to the tongue in cheek club!! :0)

You said it, carousel! Let's all go wild and start some juicy back-stabbin' scenarios! How about if that little jailbait daughter of Roger's seduces Don somehow (leave it to M. Weiner to come up with a creative way for them to be thrown together alone!) and then she blackmails him and then Roger finds out and tries to shove him off the roof of the SC building! God...we all need our fix of MM BAD...Thank God it's only another 2 weeks (or one if you count the marathon next Sun.!) Weeeeeeeeee ;- }

Hey, scfan that's a good one about Roger's little spoiled tart -jailbait..that's funny!! What about the "Duck" man's role at SC this second season? Is he going to have some hidden identity? Maybe he murdered Donald Duck and has taken over his identity? He doesn't seem like the bed hopping, sexual harassing boys he is now around at SC. Much less anyone who wants to spice up the advertising in such a provocative way. I read in the juicy gossip columns that he is bringing in American Airlines and the shift to sex in advertising is going to sky rocket. They talked about showing the leg of a woman seated on the plane who's skirt is a little too short. Will the Duck come out of the sidelines and be Joan's new sugar daddy? BTW - In MM season 1 they kept mentioning the movie "The Apartment" which is VERY similiar to the skirt chasing stuff at SC. In 1962 the movie is "Breakfast at Tiffany's". That movie was about both male and female escorts who were financially supported by sugar daddy's and cougars. Hmmm...sounds like everyone at SC will be attending the movie and making some changes in their lives.

Nice stuff, luvmadmen!! Will Peggy be the one to have to do a run through for the guys?? Will it be Marilyn Monroe they sign up to do the commercial and then you know what happens? Don is heartbroken at the loss of the ultimate celebrity sexual conquest?
More will be revealed about Shady Duck, (who falls off the wagon). There's accusations of sexual harrassment. SC are confronted by the emergence of a new sexual poilitics. The sexual supremacy of men is beginning to be challenged. But by which proto and unlikely feminist??

i see the drinking getting cut back as opposed to the smoking. i can't see bert cooper too tolerant of drinking as well as smoking, but it was too much a part of their office culture at that time. duck might have something to say about it or maybe just a cultural shift from alcohol to "maryjane". especially if the "youth" come aboard.