New Amsterdam Birds
I was just watching Episode 4: New Amsterdam, and then I realized I wanted to watch it from the beginning and take notes, so I turned it off to resume later, but that’s not why I’m telling you this.
So, to start over.
I was just watching Episode 4: New Amsterdam. Early in the episode, Betty is reading to the children and ends a book with “Church bells rang out, and the air was filled with flying birds. No kingdom had ever been happier.”
Maybe we should be collecting these. It’s starting to seem really significant.
On edit: And later in the episode, Pete offers to take Walter to see “Bye, Bye Birdie” and Walter says “I don’t like birds.” Uh huh.
January 14th, 2008 at 2:30 am
The bird motifs are really strong in Mad Men–not just in this episode, but throughout the series–especially in the episodes “Shoot” and “Babylon”. In “Shoot” the neighbor’s birds figure prominently–first as the dog’s midday meal, then as Betty’s targets. In “Babylon” Roger says he wants to keep Joan in a cage, then presents her with a gift of lovebirds.
Several characters are named after birds (Betty’s nickname is Birdie, then there’s Harry Crane, Trudy Vogel, and Duck Phillips); the agency’s name, “Sterling Cooper”, can allude to either a gilded cage or one who builds gilded cages.
Many of the literary, film, TV, and theatrical references have bird motifs as well. For example, Psycho is mentioned in “Long Weekend.” In Psycho, Norman’s hobby is taxidermy, and many of his projects are birds; Marion’s last name is Crane, and Norman mentions birds several times in his conversations with Marion. In the infamous shower sequence, the violins in the soundtrack even sound a little like screeching birds.
In the first episode, “My Fair Lady” figures prominently. Something I remember about this show is that one of the few things Eliza Doolittle actually owns is an empty bird cage, which she carries with her everywhere.
I think these bird motifs are meant to signify the characters’ captivity. They’re all trapped either by society’s conventions or their own machinations and beliefs.
January 14th, 2008 at 2:34 am
Ooops. Okay, so I’m grinandbearit, and I didn’t realize you quoted my post, and I just repeated it here. Sorry, but thanks for the props. Love your blog, and am glad to find people as obsessed with this show as I am.
January 14th, 2008 at 2:37 am
Oh, and grinandbearit is a “she”…
January 14th, 2008 at 8:48 am
Hi! Yeah, you quoted your post but it’s briliant and we love it.
I originally mislead “grinandbearit” as “grinbear” which sounded like a guy named Bear (I know several).
Are you the hullaballo? I am honored!
January 14th, 2008 at 8:50 am
Okay, but one question, when does Don call Betty “Birdie”? I only ever hear “Bets.”
January 14th, 2008 at 11:46 pm
I think I’ve seen someone named grinbear (or something similar) posting to your blog, which is why I chose hullaballoo. And no, I’m not THE hullaballoo, but now I’m intrigued and am going to have to find out more about this person…
I think Don calls Betty Birdie in nearly every episode. I’ll have to re-watch a couple of episodes to give you the particulars….I have to watch more Mad Men? Darn, but what’s a girl to do… ; -)
January 14th, 2008 at 11:51 pm
Deb, he TOTALLY calls her Birdie (Bertie?) all the time. And yeah, who the hell is THE hullaballoo?
Hull, I am now totally confused. You’re not the grinbear who posts here? But I thought that was the bird-insight person, who is in fact, you.
January 14th, 2008 at 11:57 pm
Wow, too many confusing names. There’s a really well-known political blog called Hullabaloo.
January 14th, 2008 at 11:58 pm
I’m not sure I buy the Sterling Cooper part, by the way. But it’s all so intriguing and I strongly suspect that Weiner pulled the entire motif from Psycho.
January 31st, 2008 at 10:21 am
[...] and Birdie Posted on January 31, 2008 by Deborah Lipp A while back, we were discussing all the bird symbolism in Mad Men (thanks to our genius commenter hullabaloo), and I mentioned that [...]
February 5th, 2008 at 1:18 am
You all are getting some great press. Great mention on the AMC site. Congratulations. BTW, I’m the grinandbearit who posted about the bird motifs on the AMC/Mad Men blog, then repeated the gist of that post here. When I originally started reading your blog I saw that someone named grinbear was already posting here. That’s why I chose hullaballoo (because it was somehow on my mind). Then I remembered that hullaballoo is indeed a famous political blogger…but I’m not that hullaballoo. The other hullaballoo is brilliant. I’m merely obsessed. Does that clear up any of the confusion?
February 5th, 2008 at 2:14 pm
I am totally clear now, thank you.
And by the way, it’s great to have you here. I was sure you were going to be one of the contest winners.
April 12th, 2008 at 7:13 am
I have some question
Do you know title of the book?
The book betty read to her children.
Book cover was unique but I can’t recongize title.
This episode, ‘New Amsterdam’ is so exciting..
April 12th, 2008 at 10:58 am
Hi Shain, and welcome.
I can’t get a detail on the book, but by the looks of it, and by the text she was reading, it looks like one of those old collections of fairy tales/children’s stories. I remember having one or two as kids, that could easily have dated back to this period.
Oh, and I’m guessing that the text she was reading was written for the show. It sounded like ‘generic fairy tale ending’ to me.
And yes, it is a marvelous episode.
April 12th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
Here’s another bird motif; it’s British slang for pretty women. Even American slang echoes the avian aspect, ie, “chick”. (I do love that word, btw.)
It’s also the name of another Hitchcock film (The Birds) and one of the interpretations of that film is that it is really about women’s anger and rage. Whole essays have been written about that; these lovely sweet supposedly vulnerable creatures go wild all at once and wreak havoc and mayhem. (Look at it in terms of the nascent Feminist Liberation.)
Interesting way to look at the theme within the context of this show. Weiner may not have consciously thought about all of these things we write about, but I do think that writers pick up on all of these things subconsciously.
Anyway, it’s interesting that the episode with the most bird references is the one in which Betty releases her rage, Shoot.
And I do think that the Hitchcock films of the era are mirrored in Mad Men. I think Hitchcock explored a lot of similar themes, not so much the examination of the American Dream, but certainly a lot of Hitchcock characters are impostors or mistaken for others (Marnie, Kim Novak’s dual roles in Vertigo, North by Northwest, Shadow of a Doubt, etc.).
April 12th, 2008 at 12:26 pm
And as Hullaballoo pointed out upthread (I didn’t read it when I posted my last comment), there’s also the theme of birds in Psycho, another film that indirectly deals with women’s anger (in the form of Norman’s angry mother) and need for liberation (in the form of Marion stealing the money and running away) in order to continue an illicit relationship.
April 12th, 2008 at 1:12 pm
I could swear that somewhere in here (but maybe it only stayed in my head) I talked about how Betty is the ultimate Hitchcock heroine, lying on the psychiatrist’s couch, smoking her cigarette, blond hair perfectly coiffed in her fitted gray suits.
April 12th, 2008 at 1:52 pm
I think you did!