I started watching AMC’s Mad
Men from the very first episode of the very first season. That’s not meant to be proof of my hipness,
that I watched Mad Men before it was
popular, just a statement of fact…that it also happens to prove my hipness is purely
coincidental. Mad Men at its height was one of the best shows on television, albeit
very quietly, and it long ago achieved endless critical acclaim. Now in its sixth season, the series about a
Madison Avenue advertising firm which takes place during the 1960’s finds
itself nearing the end of the decade it depicts with episode 6 making it clearly
1968 on the show. Which makes it
possible to declare another great achievement of the series: Mad Men
is a show that’s painfully accurate about the 1960’s yet has almost entirely
ignored the civil rights movement.
Mad Men at its present is slowly devolving into a bitter stream of
unconnected thoughts as it writes the end of its own era (the 1960’s) and its
main character (Don Draper) becomes a sad and depressing heap of a man—which
isn’t enjoyable to watch at all. However
episode 6 of this season was a brief respite as Mad Men returned to form in an episode that begins the night of the
MLK assassination and follows the characters in the troubled days that
followed. It was a good episode centered
around a fascinating and tragic American historical event, and it sparked
discussions across the blogosphere and on podcast about the role of race and lack
of black characters and storylines involving blacks on the show. Last year (season
5) a black character (Dawn) was brought onto the show as the secretary of the
main character (Don Draper) and a sigh of relief was breathed by followers of
the series—as evidenced by this
headline—and critics realized there was still time for Mad Men to deal with race in America in the 60’s, and hoped the
introduction of a black character was a signal it would. This echoes the sentiments of the show’s creator and writer who apparently thinks
there is still time to attack the issue.
I am done waiting. Whether the
show deals with race in the wake of Martin Luther King’s assassination or not
it has already clawed its way through the epicenter of the civil rights era and
largely ignored it. To borrow a phrase
from the unfortunate politics of George W. Bush, “mission accomplished.”
The shows main defense against its lack of racial overtones
(or undertones for that matter) is its devotion to its own premise. It’s about wealthy New York advertising
executives on Madison Avenue in the 1960’s and that world, the one the characters
inhabit, was insulated from racial issues and just actual black people in general. To be accurate and to view the world from the
characters perspective means a show mainly about white people with money over complicating
work and family life despite having it all.
I’m fine with that. The fact that
the fictional advertising firm (Stanley Cooper Draper Price or SCDP) is chocked
full of white people doesn’t bother me—this is an office of wealthy elites in Manhattan
in the 60’s, it almost certainly would be all white. The fact that the only black character on the
show (secretary Dawn) whose essentially an affirmative action hire lacks any serious
storylines doesn’t bother me. My beef is
that the show has made it all the way to 1968 through six seasons without the
characters having any serious interaction with the civil rights movement; someone
ruins one of their black tie parties in season six episode six by announcing
that MLK has been killed and the remainder of the episode is spent showing
everyone being sad. This is the first time the show has been engulfed by the events of black America.
The show has addressed the Korean War, the ramping up of the
Vietnam war, the election and later assassination of JFK. The very first
season had a closeted gay character (Sal). One character’s
husband (Joan) is sent to Vietnam, returns home and tells his wife he’s going
to reenlist, prompting their divorce as she angrily fears his almost certain
death. The shows main character (Don
Draper) attended a Rolling Stones concert with his daughter which was meant to
portray the countercultural vibe sweeping the youth of 1960’s America. Don Draper has been to California on business
and witnessed the burgeoning of hippie culture.
The show bends over backwards to demonstrate how the insular world of
wealthy liberal elites began to crack under the weight of change that occurred in
the 60’s. How the façade of the American
dream was manufactured in the advertising firms Madison avenue while
simultaneously exposed on the streets of a changing nation. At least sans the civil right movement in essence…we are to believe.
As stated, I never expected the characters of the show to
sign up for the freedom rides or participate in the March on Selma as an over
handed indication the civil rights movement was in full force. But something could have been done. Going off the assumption that there are no
black writers on the show (an extremely large and possibly offensive assumption
to make) here’s my Monday morning quarterback advice on how Mad Men could have introduced the civil
rights movement while staying true to the era and POV of the characters. Members of the fictional firm SCDP go on a
business trip to the south!! It’s that
simple. Just have the ad agency open a
contract with a business in the southern U.S. that requires them to make routine
trips to Atlanta, or Memphis, or some town in Alabama or the Carolina’s. Make these white liberal elites insulated from
all the racial rumblings occurring south of the Mason-Dixon line inadvertently
encounter the racism their world has protected them from having to see. That was after all the entire point of the civil
rights movement. It wasn’t to convert
staunch racist like the infamous Bull Connor into integrationist proponents,
but to expose the broader white masses of the country to the injustice that was
occurring—despite white America insistence on ignoring it. Namely, people just like the characters on Mad Men.
A business trip to the south in 1940 would have felt very different than
a trip there during the 60’s I’m sure. Mad Men, however, has successfully made
it through almost the entire decade with only the slightest hint that black
people everywhere are a little upset.
1960’s America—in the world of Mad
Men—only experienced cursory displays of black people feeling awkward about
the position in the social strata. Now
that’s advertising!…or just an example of the shows white producers unsure and
uncomfortable approaching the issue of race.
Probably the latter. Still a good
show though.
No comments:
Post a Comment