The Sounds of Your Own Voice

A wop bop a loo-mop, a wop bam boom!

Tutti frutti, my friends. Tutti frutti. I'm dancin' these days, and man do the days get longer, the breaths deeper, and the abyss more terrifying as you approach SHOWTIME. No need for all that really, but it happens nonetheless. Between all the working and drinking--by working I mean hopping lifting and swaying, in time; by drinking I mean to excess--there just ain't no place for nothing else.

Well I am a liar. I have also re-entered Oblivion (god help me i am prideful fool i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry) and watched more WEEDS and MAD MEN. I was checking out at the grocery store the other day and lo and behold! on the magazine rack resteth the TV GUIDE MAGAZINE. Now, I hate TV Guide for their Fox news-like stand against the writer's strike, but on the cover of this dirty rag was the following headline:

MAD MEN. THE BEST SHOW ON TELEVISION?

And the first thing that popped into my head was a "yes," the kind with the brow crunch and "obviously" intonation. There is something so gd... HILARIOUS about their protagonist. He is just REALLY serious all the time that it's like, all the other stilted period dialogue is set into theatro-surrealistic-comic relief. It's brilliant and compelling and seems extra real for being so fake. If there are any Alice Munro fans out there, it reminds me of how lasting her characters are even after you close the book. Really, it's not just Don that has that effect. Also Betty and Peggy, these actors are in no way fucking around. I don't know what it is, maybe being "period" allows you to be serious and theatrical without being Six Feet Under. If you like some of your fiction televised, you have every reason to be watching this show. Man, and they dig in deep with the advertising. The reach of media was beginning to be understood back then (in a codified, marketable way) and is STILL a burgeoningly relevant issue today. The writers never forget that the theme is what makes the show so interesting to watch, and that we can deal with Don being such a brooding alcoholic because of it: what speaks to us, what lies, and how do we sell it?

There is a bunch of who is sleeping with who in the first season (also fun, and handled in a not distracting way) but so far season two is sticking with a slightly less compressed reality and the actors are just hitting their stride.

Buzam!