Cultural References and more
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Okay folks, here it is. Cultural, counter-cultural, celebrity, historical; some geographical. It is wicked incomplete, and challengeable. That’s what email (BasketOfKisses (at) LippSisters.com) is for. Have at it.
Ep 1:01 Smoke Gets in Your Eyes
Bambi (the novel)
Enovid
Chanel
Tiffany’s
My Fair Lady (mentioned by Pete, but then alluded to again with the episode’s closing song, Vic Damone’s version of On the Street Where You Live) (referring to the show, not the movie)
Ep 1:02 Ladies Room
The Music Man (Paul calls Ken “Harold Hill”)
People Are Funny (it is mentionede by Midge, and then later it is on TV at the Draper’s)
Paul mentions both Wizard of Oz and Twilight Zone while he gives Peggy a tour of the office.
Toot Shor’s Restaurant and The Four Seasons restaurant
Khrushchev banging his shoe
St. Vincent’s Hospital
Jack Kerouac
The Lindbergh baby
Hitler Youth
Bomb shelters and “the bomb”
Who are candidates that might run against Nixon? Roger mentions Kennedy, Symington, and Eleanor Roosevelt.
The (New York) Journal American
Ep 1:03 Marriage of Figaro
Elvis Presley returning from the Army
Department stores: Saks, Henry Bendel, Bonwit Teller
Life Magazine
Volkswagen “Lemon” ad by Doyle Dane Bernbach
Ep 1:04 New Amsterdam
Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart
WPA ads
Hiroshima
Manhattan locations: The Armory, The St. Regis, The Century Club,
Gracie Mansion
Long Island locations: Fisher’s Island, The Maidstone Club
Dartmouth
Ep 1:05 5G
Magazines: Advertising Age, Atlantic Monthly, Life, Town and Country, Reader’s Digest (again), Boy’s Life, the New Yorker, Look Magazine
The 4H
Bix Biderbeck
The Empire State Building
Ep 1:06 Babylon
The Red Balloon (This is open for interpretation/debate. It’s a visual metaphor; never outwardly alluded to. There is a red balloon that the family carries home and into the children’s bedroom at the end of the day.)
The Best of Everything (and the film).
Adolf Eichmann arrested in Argentina
Mickey Mantle was robbed (unable to corroborate this)
Ep 1:07 Red in the Face
The Naked and the Dead as a pun on Norman Mailer and Mayor Wagner together.
Hitler and Neville Chamberlain in Munich
Jonathan Swift is quoted by Roger Sterling: “He was a bold man that first ate an oyster.”
Ep 1:08 The Hobo Code
Hobo codes!
Marty
Dancing to “The Twist”
The Wizard of Oz: “I feel like Dorothy, everything just turned to color”
Wall Street Journal
Idyllwild Airport
Robert Mitchum
Miles Davis
Joseph McCarthy
Standing Liberty quarter
One of the beatniks says either “That dead kid in Biloxi,” or “ten dead kids in Biloxi.” This appears to be a reference to either Emmett Till (not Biloxi but Money, MS), killed in 1955, or the Biloxi Beach Riots (1960”but not ten kids).
Bertram Cooper refers to Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand
Ep 1:09 Shoot
Lysol
Pan Am
Three Coins in the Fountain
Coca-Cola
Esso
Ep 1:10 Long Weekend
Psycho
“I feel like I’m stuck somewhere between Doris Day in Pillow Talk and Midnight Lace, when what I need to be is Kim Novak in just about anything.”
The scene of Roger riding Mirabelle like a horse is a take on a similar scene in La Dolce Vita. Matt Weiner suggests that perhaps Roger saw the movie and got the idea from it.
Block Island (Mona’s vacation spot)
Roger suggests the Colony restaurant to Joan, it was known as “the most expensive restaurant in New York.”
Dr. Scholl’s is lost to Leo Burnett, a well-known Chicago agency; when Roger hears, he mocks the city of Chicago.
Pete refers to Peggy as “Howdy Dowdy,” a reference to the Howdy Doody Show, which Pete must have watched as a child; it ran from 1947 to 1960 and so was just cancelled when Pete said this.
Abraham Menken refers to a “Czarist Ministry”
Carol smells Joan and asks if she’s wearing Shalimar
Roger tells Mirabelle, “I want to suck your blood like Dracula”
Ep 1:11 Indian Summer
Pete says that he got the “PER” (later the Relaxiciser) from Compton Advertising, because they’d given Firestone to Compton to resolve Sterling Cooper’s conflict with Goodyear. Compton was founded in 1935 and taken over in 1984.
Ken suggests the PER looks like it’s made from a Lionel transformer, referring to Lionel train sets.
Betty reads Family Circle in bed
The salesman works for Frederick air conditioners
When Joan is putting makeup on Roger, he asks if she’s going to “draw freckles on me like Raggedy Andy.”
During the Lucky Strike meeting, there is discussion of tobacco lawsuits, the Surgeon General’s office, and the possibility of putting a warning on cigarette packages.
Peggy’s date has a sister who is a secretary at Bulova in Flushing.
Don and Betty watch the Danny Thomas show, sponsored by General Foods.
In the Rejuvenator/Relaxiciser meeting, the guys refer to Mitch’s wife as Jayne Mansfield.
A Place In the Sun (Rachel’s sister Barbara refers to a movie where the mistress of the married man gets pregnant and he kills her.)
Bertram Cooper tells Don Draper that he will introduce him to Ayn Rand
Ep 1: 12 Nixon vs. Kennedy
(Paul says, in a discussion about Duck Phillips, Her name was Rosetta. Rosetta Stone. That’s from something, right? I thought Vertigo, but I’m not coming up with anything.)
Highway Patrol (Paul says Peggy resembles Broderick Crawford.)
Harry and Jennifer were going to go see Can-Can.
Ep 1: 13 The Wheel
Tom Vogel, Trudy’s father, mentions a “surge in adolescence.” This is an early reference to the Baby Boom. Today we forget that, although the Boom started right after World War II, it wasn’t a known demographic until it was almost over.
This also ties in with mentioning Clearasil as a potential account, and its parent, the
Vicks Chemical Company.
Tom also mentions a theory that ties the winner of a presidential campaign to whomever wins the Cleveland Browns versus Washington Redskins game.
Pete tells Don that Cooper wants him to read Ayn Rand. Of course, Cooper also wanted Don to read Ayn Rand; it’s apparently Cooper’s way of telling someone they’re “in.”
Harry tells Don that he was once fascinated by the cave paintings at Lascaux. It’s possible that Harry actually saw these caves, which were not closed to the public until 1963.
Kodak Carousel Slide Projector, the pivotal metaphorical ad campaign this episode, was introduced in the spring of 1962.
Duck is especially pleased to have gotten the Kodak account away from BBDO. BBDO is a major advertising agency founded in 1928.
Basket of Kisses: The unofficial blog of AMC's Mad Men. Where all the cool kids meet & greet to talk about Don Draper, Janie Bryant, Christina Hendricks, Jon Hamm, Matthew Weiner, & subtexty things.
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August 5th, 2008 at 4:33 pm
An interesting cultural reference is the Drapers’ address on Bullet Park Road. As far as I can tell, there is no such road in Ossining, but Bullet Park is a novel by John Cheever set in the Ossining area.
August 7th, 2008 at 9:40 am
Her name was Rosetta…I think it's a parody; I don't think it's from anything, I think it's Paul playing on the Niagara Falls routine ("Slowly he turned…").
August 7th, 2008 at 10:23 am
The Rosetta Stone, discovered in the late 18th century, resides at the British Museum and is one of it's most famous artifacts. The stone was created in the second century AD and translated ancient Egyptian languages into Greek. It became the key to the 19th century translations of Egyptian hieroglyphics by the British. The lady that landed Duck in trouble in London worked for the British Museum. Paul loves a pun.
August 7th, 2008 at 10:34 am
I knew what the Rosetta Stone was, although I didn't pick up the British Museum connection. I am referring to the way that Paul said the line. I'm pretty sure that's Niagara Falls.
August 7th, 2008 at 11:06 am
What the hell am I thinking of in Vertigo?
August 7th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
@Roberta:
Mad Men has a lot of indirect references to Vertigo. There's a dream sequence that features a falling man which is very similar to the title sequence of Mad Men. Both feature an illustrator named Midge. They both explore themes of constructed characters, dual identities, and being haunted by one's past. Kim Novak's Judy character worked at Magnin's, while the Rachel Menken character was originally supposed to be Rachel Magnin. And the scene of Don in the restaurant of the Savoy is reminiscent of the scenes at Ernie's Restaurant when Jimmy Stewart's character originally sees "Madelyn," then becomes so obsessed with her that every woman at Ernie's begins to resemble her.
August 7th, 2008 at 12:12 pm
True dat.
But what is the line from Vertigo that I thought was the Rosetta Stone line? I gotta rent it.
August 7th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
I forgot about Ernie's. Now I have to rent it too.
August 7th, 2008 at 12:23 pm
I don't think Vertigo had a Rosetta Stone line. They did say Carlotta Valdes a lot, though. Carlotta, Rosetta…they sound similar…a little. Okay, I'm stretching.
August 7th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
Vertigo is on next week. I posted. I think cultural history is both culture and history, Coop. Okay, that was stupid, sorry.
August 7th, 2008 at 12:42 pm
THAT'S IT!!!
Carlotta. They said it a lot.
wheww. I guess for now I'll leave it up there, in NvK, as it led to all this discussion. someday I'll just change it to the niagra thing and delete all this. all this… evidence that my memory is shot to shit.
August 7th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
Maybe my Ernie's references are off. I mean, physically, the scenes don't resemble each other–Ernie's was dark with richly saturated colors, while the scenes at the Savoy were kind of pale. I just remember Hitchcock filmed Kim Novak's character (and other blondes at the restaurant) as if they were ghosts–all wraithlike and ethereal, floating through the restaurant. In FTWTY, they achieved a similar effect by doing the slow dissolves/zooms as Betty descended the stairs. In both scenes you had these apparitions of womanhood, these projections as envisioned by the male protagonists of the story. But the realities of those women were starkly different from the visions of them. It's why Jimmy Stewart kept trying to reconstruct Kim Novak's Judy character, but no matter what he did, she was never completely "it." I think Don is going through the same thing with Betty–she's never going to be "it," despite the number of furs he gives her.
August 18th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
Look what thus spake drake has:
August 21st, 2008 at 4:48 pm
Hmm. Interesting about Queen Marguerite of Burgundy and her wanting to take revenge against her one night stands. I was thinking Bobbie reminded me of Alex in Fatal Attraction, and we know what happened there. She is the type who would get all up in Don's business the more he tried to resist her. Maybe she'll be the figurative body at the bottom of the lake from "A Place in the Sun?"
August 21st, 2008 at 4:58 pm
Okay, I just looked up that film (La Tour de Nesle), and IMDB says that it's one of the few COLOR films that was produced in the French cinema during the 1950s. The film Don was watching was black and white. So I guess it's still a mystery. I think I'm still going for Last Year at Marienbad, or possibly Hiroshima Mon Amour. It's been years since I've seen either of those movies, so I could be wrong. It wouldn't be the first time…
August 21st, 2008 at 6:09 pm
I think the color definitely eliminates it.
October 2nd, 2008 at 3:57 pm
Would "red balloon" refer to the children's story, "Goodnight Moon" by Margaret Wise Brown? The red balloon is in the child's room at the end of the evening… "goodnight light and the red balloon…"
Just a thought!
July 22nd, 2009 at 11:43 am
Jonathan Swift is quoted by Roger Sterling in Ep 1:07 Red in the face ("He was a bold man that first ate an oyster").
July 22nd, 2009 at 12:08 pm
Roger Sterling recites a couplet from Buckingham Palace by Alan Alexander Milne to Alice Cooper in Ep 2:12 The Mountain King.
"They're changing guard at Buckingham Palace –
Christopher Robin went down with Alice."
July 23rd, 2009 at 5:35 am
Ugarte, you're a wonder! I didn't know the Jonathan Swift quote; thanks.
July 23rd, 2009 at 8:04 am
Deborah, thanks to you (and Roberta) for the awesome site!
I would like to point out a mistake I made. Roger Sterling actually says "They're changing THE guard at Buckingham Palace."