I think January looked beautiful. Then, again, I think she would look great in a flour sack. She is stunning!

I didn't see her dress but I agree that her beauty is ethereal. Additionally, her clothes as Betty are more lovely than current fashions IMO since the clothes of the early sixties were anything but flattering (unless you were Sophia, Gina or Marilyn). Since Betty dresses quite conservatively, she makes those housefrau duds come alive. And when she DOES step out fashion wise DON flips out! (Yellow bikini with gauze topper!) She is reminiscent of Jeri Ryan as the Borg drone (of Star Trek 7 of 9) in that her character is very subdued but the actress is so heart stoppingly gorgeous, one can't help but stare transfixed. Unfortunately, this makes certain folks ignore the incredible talent - Like January and Jeri. I wonder if January Jones parents named her after Jacqueline Susann's 70's protagonist in "Once Is Not Enough"? It's rather an unusual name, bloggers?

I think I read it was exactly what you said, Hyperboliz, as to how she got her name plus she said she was born in January. I think it's a cool name, too...I was born in January as well (1951) but I have an ordinary name (Kathey)--- but at least it's spelled a bit different than the usual way...my dad's idea.

January is lovely - but that dress was awful. Don't these ladies have stylists who clue them in? Mary Tyler Moore should have been told that her arms, at her age, need to be covered, even if she is thin. When she held her arm out, it looked like dead chicken meat falling off a bone. Unless you're into corpse glamour, very unappealing.

I thought most of the show was less than professional.

flower - 'corpse glamour?' you are hysterical........I didn't see Ms. Moore but your comment about her arms has been popping up all over the web today. Was it really that hideous? Wow - I'm surprised and disappointed to hear that but MTM is rather lucky to be alive given her Type 1 diabetes and bouts of ETOHism over the years. Normally those two factors are incompatible with life.

Actually I think they already have. However, it's an undergarment. :-)

Agreed. I love Mary Tyler Moore (and I waited on her when I worked at Bergdorf Goodman some years ago), but her arms looked terrible!

She had a great body for a woman her age, but it just goes to show you, even an "in shape" woman has to cover up after a certain age.

I mean, she HAS a great body -- she's not dead yet.

And I think January Jones is absolutely gorgeous!

Yep, Gail Klein and flowerpower, MTM definitely needed sleeves and/or a shawl...I agree that she needs to fire her stylist--- if she even has one. Really, all it would have taken is one look in a mirror (or a kind/tactful husband or friend) and she could have gone to her closet and grabbed her black, sequined 3/4 (OR LONG) SLEEVED evening jacket (you know a woman her age owns at least one!) and not had to be seen on global TV looking like her arms were...how did you so perfectly put it,flower?--"dead chicken meat falling off a bone"....Sheeeesh

it is really sad what happens to our bodies as we age

I think that is what Madonna is fighting but her arms look bizarre too

....still haven't seen it, but isn't she married to a plastic surgeon? it's not that hard to correct, is it?

anyway, i don't care. i love her and she's an institution. i grew up on classics like the mary tyler moore show, and love the dick van dyke show.

I didn't like January Jones' dress. It looked like an extended Merry Widow.

Speaking (or not) of the early sixties, the Dick Van Dyke show started in 1961.

And that wasn't MTM's first show. She was "Legs" on Richard Diamond and did a ton of shows before and during the DvD show. A very busy lady during that period.

Her credits on imdb (in the biography section) go back to 1955 when she was a dancing kitchen appliance elf - Happy Hotpoint. Her official credits start in 1958.

Dry Manhattan: She's married to a doctor, but he's not a plastic surgeon. He's about 18 years younger than she is. They met because he was her mother's doctor. I met a guy once who knew him and said he was the biggest nerd in the world! Never had a date, never went out, a total dweeb. And when he wound up married to MTM, nobody could believe it!

Truth really is stranger than fiction.

I don't know which one of you mention this on another thread, it might have been Zere, but it was about January's dress (which I have now, sadly, seen) being a skirted version of the Maidenform 'Long Line'? That was precisely what it looked like!!! I think we're gotten used to Betty looking so incredible in everyday period garments that the sight of January Jones wearing a 'now' design simply cannot do her justice. Yet I know some of you loved it - so it all comes down to personal taste, doesn't it? Anyone know where I can see this shot of MTM where time has ravaged her arms?

The only cure for MTM's arms would be gaining a little bit of weight, and that she won't/can't do, I am sure. So the next best thing would be to cover them up. It is too bad she is getting all this negative feedback about her arms, because I thought she looked better (hair and makeup) than she has in a long time.

Hyper: That was MY line about the Maidenform long-line. Glad you liked it.

Man, I missed MTM and her arms. I'll have to google around and find some photos. One of my girlfriends went and had her arm-fat sucked out of her. Did it on a lunch hour... just a couple tiny holes where they sucked it out and wah-la! Fixed.

It wasn't a pretty sight, LaurieB. There's a certain point where you have to acknowledge your age in regard to your style of dressing. Even though MTM has a great figure (wish I had it), her "bat wing" arms should've been in long-sleeve, and she still would've looked stylish and beautiful. She should take a page out of Oprah's book - who always looks great for her weight and figure. Oprah really knows how to dress beautifully and accommodate her figure and age, and be an absolute knock-out.

MTM is painfully thin from her diabetes, and can't seem to gain weight. She did look better than she has in a long time. She's still very pretty. If I could look that good at her age, I wouldn't be crying.

It is hard to see them age, but we all get old. By the end we usually end up looking like basset hounds, so......if we end up at peace and happy, that's all that counts!

MTM was born in December 1936, so she's looking VERY good for a 71 year old!

Yes, she still has a great face. So great, I think she had "work done". I wonder how old she really is, anybody know?

My sister is 52, in top shape, swims every day and still has loose upper arms. They just sag with age. Did anybody see the Bett Midler concert- she was singing and her upper arm fat began to jiggle- she made a big joke out of it. Right there on stage she wobbled it back and forth.

Candace Bergen took the opposite approach and covered up like she was in Antarctica. Her neck seemed to disappear!

I love to see the older stars, but it's heartbreaking when they look so bad and they were once so incredibly beautiful.

As my mother used to say, "You've got to grow old gracefully."

Let Me Grow Lovely

Let me grow lovely, growing old--
So many fine things do:
Laces, and ivory, and gold,
And silks need not be new;
And there is healing in old trees,
Old streets a glamour hold;
Why may not I, as well as these,
Grow lovely, growing old?

Karle Wilson Baker

Whoa, Jamm54- MTM is 71!!? She does look good.

Yeah, kind of a shocker isn't it? Our Laura Petrie/Mary Richards is 71! She's looking damn good in my book. I can't think of any other 70-somethings pulling off wearing that gown. So she did alright (I still would've gone with long or 3/4 sleeves myself), and she looked beautiful.

Probably the greatest antidote to age is happiness. That always shines through in a person more than anything else.

January is lovely. She puts me in mind of a Barbie doll, and her particular look was the standard of beauty from the 50's to the mid-late 60's but then the standard changed to a more athletic-looking (Tiegs, Cybil, Brinkley,) standard, and then soon to follow the "exotics". January looks like everybody's mother wanted to look back then in crinoline.

OMG January's Emmy dress was horrible! I just saw it, and it looks like what goes "under" the dress. What was she thinking? Does she not have a mirror?

zerelda, what a great poem...I shall copy it and keep it for referring to in my "golden years"---which at 57 ain't all that far down the road!! lol
jamm, you are right about MTM, she isn't bad at all for 71. "By the end we usually end up looking like basset hounds" ! You crack me up but it's so true. Look at Robert Redford...he has said before he has decided to "just let nature take it's course"...and man does he look it! Like you said, just enjoy life in spite of outward appearances.
I say just judge everyone by their hearts instead of their "outsides"!

The idea of the dress and hair was good, the execution was not. I liked the lower part of the dress, but the structured corset part of the bodice did not look finished - it just looked like a corset and not an evening gown. The strings of jewels in the hair would have looked great if the hair itself was not so messy.

I thought Christina Hendricks (Joan) was positively stunning in her dress!! Red hair, and a green colored dress. Who woulda thunk!!
January Jones and Elizabeth Moss looked gorgeous too!!
Next year it's the ladies of Mad Men turn to win big time!!!
Maybe Matt Weiner would consider a "Win a trip to the Emmys contest for 2009"!!??
Sign me up!! As long as I don't have to do a video! LOL!!!

Christina was a gorgeous goddess in green (how's that for alliteration). And it's obvious that they're not padding her costumes. ;) Love it!

60's child - You're totally right about the MM ladies and their chances of an Emmy nom next year. January Jones has already earned her stripes with the last episode and Betty's breakdown. Plus, if the pay off for the Peggy character is as big as I'm expecting by the end of the season, Elizabeth Moss may also earn her nom.

SC Fan: Robert Redford had an eye-lift a few years ago. He's probably had a face-lift too. Paul Newman had a face-lift, Jack Lemmon before he died had one . . . the list goes on.

They ALL have "work done" now -- it's not even optional anymore.

I don't believe any of them who say they're "natural."

January's dress,I think it was a Gaultier,but she probably would have faired better in a different style. She is so beautiful that she could probably wear any old thing and still be a knockout. She is modeling a dress in the September issue of Marie Claire magazine. It's a black dress and she looks fantastic. Very weird to see her outside of her Betty period clothing.As far as beloved old stars aging, it is a shockeroo to get a glimpse of them. We saw Jane Fonda at a book signing here in ATL and she really looked much older than the photos in a magazine where you can airbrush away the wrinkles and sun damage.

@scfan: Gail's right, Robert Redford did have a facelift. After he did it, he didn't look the same at all. He had kind of ruined his looks hanging out in the Utah/Park City/Sundance mtns all those years. And I swear, after his facelift, the pitch of his voice was never the same again (he had a pretty extreme one because there wasn't a wrinkle on him afterward). Well, their "face/looks" are their paycheck, but it's kind of a shame age isn't represented truthfully on screen.

Although, the guy who made me swoon was Richard Farnsworth, a former Hollywood stuntman who turned to acting (The Grey Fox, Comes a Horseman, The Natural, Misery, The Getaway, The Straight Story, Anne of Green Gables). His looks personified "cowboy" for me.

I didn't care for January Jones dress either. I think she would've looked better in a ice blue or seafoam color or something to set off her "blondeness".

@scfan: well it's true isn't it......we do end up looking like basset hounds. Might as well accept it, and be grateful if we have a smile on our face!

jamm..."a smile on our faces"...And our health!
Gail & jamm: I didn't know about RR's face/eye work...I agree that they all do most likely(even if they do try to convince us ticket buyers otherwise!) have "work" done...why not, I suppose, as jamm said...their "face/looks IS their paycheck"--- and closeups don't lie.
But, it always does seem to give them that "constantly suprised" look, huh? lol
(ie: Kenny Rogers) : - +

Health is the biggie that's for sure.

Yeah, the "frozen face" look. They might as well wear a Kabuki mask!! Thank god the "blow fish lips" look seems to be declining. If I saw one more set of Mick Jagger lips on an actress who formerly didn't have them before (heck, even Mick Jagger doesn't have them anymore), I thought I'd scream.

And poor Priscilla Presley. Did her see her on Dancing with the Stars last year? Ewww......All that money and tries to save a buck by going to some Argentinian hack. She was told she can't be fixed either. What a shame. She was a real beauty.

Photo of Priscilla:

http://www.exposay.com/celebrity-photos/priscilla-presley-2007-clive-davis-pre-grammy-awards-party-jm5ntg.jpg

Yes, LaurieB, she was very pretty (remember her from the Naked Gun movies?). When I've seen recent pictures of her now, it's like I'm looking at "Elvira - the Halloween Lady". What the hell did she do to her looks? She's just plain scary looking now. Was she going for the "goth" look or something? Uff da.

Here's a link:

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/thedishrag/2008/09/mad-mens-januar.html

I too did not care for the outfit. Looks like the Merry Widow she wore a couple of epi's ago.

Pity.

All I could think of when I saw Mary Tyler Moore was, "Doesn't she know what her own arms look like when she raises them?" I thought as we grow older we become aware of our less attractive "parts" and dress accordingly. That's all anyone remembers about her being on the Emmys. Also, (per another posting above) I agree about Robert Redford. He didn't need to do anything to himself. He always looked great until he had that strange eye lift. It completely changed his expression. He should have let himself age naturally.

Not for nothing, but I think Joe Biden had a face-lift too. He also had hair transplants.

You should see some of the dames I see working at Saks 5th Ave.!

Gail: Did you have a fun birthday?

MTM was on Lipstick Jungle last night. Played Brooke Shields mother and was well-covered - LOL.