This week on Mad Men: Samsonite suitcases are everywhere. Don Draper is avoiding calling California. Duck is a drunk, and is also a huge jerk. Roger Sterling’s memoirs are hilarious. Don’s secretary has a past that you probably don’t want to know about. And, Peggy and Don have lots of Moments.
Harry has tickets to a boxing match between Cassius Clay, who you know better as Muhammad Ali, and Sonny Liston. Someone says that Clay would make a good ad man, and Don says he’s right. Then he puts $100 on Liston.
At the Samsonite meeting, Peggy, Stan, Danny, the new guy they hired last episode, and Joey, some random guy possibly from the art department, sit Don behind his desk and start to act out a commercial, which involves Peggy knocking people down with Samsonite suitcases to protect football quarterback Joe Namath. Don says that endorsements are lazy, and he doesn’t like Namath. Peggy says, he’s very handsome. Don says that women don’t buy suitcases. Peggy says they do. Don asks everyone else to leave.
Don: Peggy, I’m glad that this is an environment where you feel free to fail.
Peggy: You wanted to go with Danny’s idea.
Don: Because it works. Only Samsonite is tough. It’s the execution that’s the problem.
Peggy: OK. Should it be funny?
Don: Actually funny? Maybe. Funny like what I just saw? No.
Then Peggy goes to her office, and finds flowers and a box from Duck. She calls him, because he remembered her birthday, and then she opens the box, which turns out to be full of business cards that have “Phillips-Olson Advertising” on them and her title as Creative Director. Duck says he wants to form an agency that specialized in women’s products, with her as creative director. Duck says he has a plan that involves Tampax, then he makes a train noise. Then it turns out he is at home because he’s lost his job, and that he’s having problems getting a credit line.
Peggy: I don’t know whether to take this seriously, because I suspect you’ve been drinking.
Duck: Well. you’re wrong.
Peggy: I heard about the Clios.
Duck: I have to see you tonight.
Because that always works. Then he tells her he’s falling apart, and that Peggy was the last thing that make him feel good about himself. Then Stan, Danny, and Joey come in and Peggy hangs up on him.
Stan: We’re going to lunch.
Peggy: He hated it.
Stan: I was hating it too, while we were doing it. But not before, I’m not going to lie.
They go to lunch.
Don’s secretary tells him he has an urgent message from Stephanie in California, no last name, would he like her to place the call? Don says he’ll get it and goes into his office and sits down to call her, but doesn’t. Then Roger comes in and tells him their evening’s ruined because Freddy Rumsen and Cal Rutledge from Pond’s have decided to join them for dinner and the fight.
Roger: Which means we’re going to have to drink before dinner if we’re going to drink at all. And then there’s the stories about drinking, where they start off funny and end up crying. 15 months I’ve been waiting for this fight. $300. Liston has to lose by unconsciousness.
Don: Get rid of them.
Roger: I can’t.
Don: I have to work on Samsonite.
Roger: That’s in two weeks. I’m going to be in Florida. This is your job too.
Don gets out of it.
Elsewhere, Peggy, Joey and Danny are presumably working on Samsonite.
Joey: I don’t know what it is, but there’s something about your neck that makes me wish I could have one of those James Bond pens so I could jam a dart into it.
Danny is not phased by this. Peggy heads to the bathroom because she is 26, today, and Mark is taking her to the forum of the Four Caesars for her birthday. Then Trudy comes in and says she likes it when her baby kicks her.
Peggy: Is it any different than living with Pete?
Trudy: You’re witty. I always assumed that but it turns out it’s true.
Then they talk about the fight, and Trudy tells happy birthday, because you know, 26 is still very young. Peggy doesn’t respond to this. She and Trudy walk out of the bathroom and see Pete immediately, who has a weird, shifty look on his face.
Peggy goes to see Don right before she leaves. Don asks what she has on Samsonite. Peggy says they’ll have something to show him in the morning. Don says he just wants to see where they are. Peggy says she guesses she has a minute.
Peggy: We see Samsonite as a very rare substance, the rarest on earth, and we see it jumping through a cave like a superhero.
Don: Is this substance much like bullshit?
Peggy presents a few more ideas. Don is unimpressed.
Don: I gave you more responsibility and you don’t do anything.
Peggy: That you like. We did work. A lot.
Don: I don’t care if you work 10 seconds if you bring me something I like. We’re going to do this right now. I know you have plans. You’re going to call me from a bar with an idea, you think elves do this?
Peggy: You’re just going to change it any way.
Don: Excuse me?
Peggy goes to take off her coat and calls Mark to say she’s going to be a few minutes late. Mark relays this to the several other guests at the table, including Peggy’s mother, who it seems Peggy doesn’t know about. Then she goes and pitches Samsonite ideas while Don talks about boxing.
Don: Do you like Cassius Clay?
Peggy: He’s very handsome.
Don: I don’t like him.
Peggy: You’re not supposed to. I remember my mother talking about Nat King Cole in a way that made my father throw out all his records.
Don suggests that the Samsonite commercial should be boxing-themed. The phone rings, and it is Roger.
Peggy: Hello? Roger. No, he’s not here. I answer other people’s phones all the time.
Roger: I’m going to count to three, and then I’m going to start saying a lot of words you don’t like, sweetheart.
Then Roger begs Don to join him. Don tells him, goodnight, sweetheart.
Then Peggy’s phone rings, it’s Mark, and he tells her she has to get down here right away, it’s been almost an hour. Peggy says just go to her apartment and wait, they’ll have dinner another time. Mark says he has her whole family with him, and the only way she can make it worse is by not coming at all. Peggy says oh.
Then Peggy goes to tell Don she’s going to leave. Don yells at her to get over birthdays, and go ahead, he’ll do it himself. Peggy goes to get in the elevator. Then she calls Mark and cancels. Mark yells, Peggy yells, then Peggy’s mother gets on the phone and also yells. This scene: there is lots of yelling. Then Peggy tells Mark he’s like her mother. Then they break up.
Peggy walks into Don’s office, and pours herself a drink.
Peggy: I think I just broke up with Mark.
Don: Really? So go home.
Peggy: Nope. I’m ready to work. You win. Again.
Don says she could have just told him it was her birthday. Peggy says it isn’t her fault he doesn’t have a family or friends or anywhere else to go. Don says she doesn’t have to be there. Peggy says she does have to be there, because of some stupid idea from Danny, who Don hired because he stole some other stupid idea from Danny, because Don was drunk. Then they argue about credit for the Glo-Coat commercial.
Don: There are no credits on commercials.
Peggy: But you got the Clio.
Don: It’s your job. I give you money, you give me ideas.
Peggy: But you never say thank you!
Don: That’s what the money’s for!
Then Peggy leaves to cry in the bathroom.
Don sits down to talk about ideas for Samsonite, rewinds his dictophone, and calls Peggy in. It turns out that the tape is from Roger’s memoirs, and Roger is talking about the queen of perversion, Ida Blankenship, otherwise known as Don’s current secretary. They also learn that Bert Cooper’s testicles were removed in the height of his sexual prime by Lyle Evans, MD, who Roger thinks Bert had killed.
Peggy says she should go. Don says stay. They start to have a personal conversation, but there is a mouse. Peggy jumps on a chair. Don says hand me that Samsonite suitcase, because he wants to put the mouse in it and throw it off the building.
Don: Come on, every idea you have is some version of that.
Peggy: …Do you think it’s a rat?
Then they go for dinner. They are still talking about suitcases though.
Don: The best idea always wins, and you know it when you see it, Keep banging your head against the wall, and it happens.
Peggy: And then it’s done.
Then Peggy says she’s knows what she’s supposed to want, but it never feels right, or as important as anything in that office. Then they talk about the Korean War, how Peggy’s father died right in front of her when she was 12, and how Don saw his father die too, when he was kicked by a horse. They are, incidentally, sitting next to a painting.
Peggy: Why is there a dog in the Parthenon?
Don: That is a roach. Let’s go someplace darker.
They do. Peggy complains about dating. Don says she’ll find someone, because she’s cute as hell.
Peggy: Everybody thinks I slept with you, to get the job. They joke about it. Like it’s so funny, because the possibility was so remote.
Don: It’s not because you aren’t attractive. I have to keep rules about work. I have to. You’re an attractive girl, Peggy.
Peggy: Not as attractive as some of your other secretaries, I guess.
Don: You don’t want to start giving me morality lessons, do you? People do things, right?
Then they talk about Peggy’s illegitimate child. Peggy says her mother thinks Don was responsible, because he was the only person who visited her in the hospital.
Then they listen to the fight end with the first round, when Clay knocked out Liston. They leave, and Peggy runs with Don to the men’s room at SCDP, where is is really, really sick. Peggy hears someone calling for her in the hall and goes out to find Duck trying to go to the bathroom on what he thinks is Don’s chair, in what is actually Roger’s office. Peggy starts walking him out, and then Don spots them.
Duck tells Don that he and Peggy were in love, but it turns out she’s just another whore. Then Don punches him, and they wrestle to the ground. Peggy asks Duck what the hell is wrong with him, and Duck says, let’s go.
Peggy goes to Don’s office and says she got rid of him. Peggy apologizes. Don says she doesn’t have to explain.
Don: Can you get me a drink?
Peggy: How long are you going to go on like this?
Don: I have to make a phone call, and I know it’s going to be bad.
Don apologizes for embarrassing her, and falls asleep with his head in Peggy’s lap. At some point in the night, he wakes up and sees Anna’s ghost, carrying what appears to be a Samsonite suitcase. Product placement in the afterlife: just one of the many services that SCDP offers its clients. Ghost Anna smiles, and turns away, and disappears.
In the morning, Don wakes up and calls Stephanie immediately, and learns that Anna has died, and has left her body to science so she could go to UCLA medical school tuition-free. Then he hands up, and cries. Peggy asks who died. Don says, the only person in the world who ever knew me. Peggy says that’s not true. Don says she should go home. Instead, she goes and sleeps on the couch in her office.
Stan wakes her up at 10:30 by blowing a whistle in her ear.
Peggy goes to Don’s office, still wearing her coat and clothing yesterday. She looks like she spend the night in the office. Don doesn’t, and has also come up with an ad for Samsonite playing on the fight the night before. Then they have a Moment. Then Don tells her to go home, shower, come back, and give him ten tag lines.
Next time on Mad Men: Don’s secretary has had eye surgery, possibly to counter the long-lasting effects of an affair with Bert Cooper. And! Don calls Bethany.
[Images via AMC]