Abstract
Mad Men, the series cited in the book’s title and aired in the United States from July 2007 to May 2015, is one of the most important products of contemporary American culture. The story is set in an advertising agency on Madison Avenue, New York, between 1960 and 1970. The series finale ends with the actual and classic Coca-Cola commercial “I’d like to buy the world a Coke,” produced by McCann Erickson and premiered on TV in July 1971. Seemingly encapsulating the whole essence of the counterculture of the time, the spot and its jingle speak of diversity, love, peace, and harmony.
This commercial and the previous scene, which closes with the anti-hero and protagonist, Don Draper, smiling with quiet satisfaction, are mentioned several times in the book. The way authors interpret this scene is a key to its analysis.
Booker and Batchelor—researchers and authors of several volumes on cultural studies and popular culture—suggest that the Coca-Cola spot is yet another Draper creation. Like capitalism itself at the time, Draper would have succeeded not only in assimilating the counterculture and neutralizing its character as opposed to the capitalist system, but also in transforming it into a product to win even more consumers.
It is this process—the commoditization of American culture carried out during the 1960s—that the book tackles.
Mad Men was praised not only for its plot, but also for its fidelity to the visual look of the decade. Booker and Batchelor, however, say that it is not a real representation of the United States at that time, but rather the representation of an imaginary world. It would be a kind of simulacrum or a pastiche of the 1960s, concepts respectively of Jean Baudrillard and Frederic Jameson. In the work, Jameson and other Marxist theorists are referenced to understand the 1960s as a bridge between the (still largely) modern culture of the 1950s and the completely post-modern 1970s.
Passing over this bridge, we find characters in search of the already-distorted American dream, who are also compromised by various types of vice, such as smoking, drinking, drugs, and sex. If this narrative baffles viewers accustomed to a more idealized and romantic version of the 1960s, it also suggests that perhaps little has changed in half a century. One can think about the sexual harassment still present in advertising. In fact, in 2016, the same year the book came out, the CEO of one of the world’s most important advertising agencies was forced to resign due to accusations of sexism and racism.
This way of speaking of the present through the past garners a lot of attention from the authors. After brilliantly discussing the meanings of intertextuality promoted by the presence of cultural products in the series—books, music, movies—Booker and Batchelor propose Mad Men as a kind of science fiction. And like the best exemplars of the genre, it would demand cognitive responses with highly political connotations—such as the critique of consumer capitalism that intensified at the time.
In this section, juvenile counterculture is also discussed, as well as the challenge encountered by Draper—a man still anchored in values and the style of the 1950s—in keeping up with the changes. His understanding and domination of this era and its (counter)culture would only occur in the early 1970s, manifested by the creation of the Coca-Cola flagship ad. The fact that this happens in California—the location of the final scene—is not by chance. In fact, California points to important transitional moments in the narrative, and so the authors devote a whole chapter to the exploration of this important role.
The last chapters of the book discuss the main female characters, including the petty and frustrated Betty Draper. The protagonist’s wife is the only one not to have a “happy ending.” While the former secretary Joan becomes a businesswoman, and the copywriter Peggy is on her way to becoming the 1970s Don Draper, Betty finishes the series diagnosed with lung cancer.
This event makes one think about the role of smoking in Mad Men. Booker and Batchelor associate cigarettes and advertising, showing the pervasiveness of both in American life, with detrimental effects to the consumer but still tolerated with the comfortable justification of being a “necessary evil.” However, the authors do not comment on the role that this pervasiveness might have in a series broadcast in the early decades of the 2000s. Would not Mad Man, like other contemporary cultural products, be the way cigarette brands found to circumvent restrictions and promote their products?
It could be argued that Betty’s death from lung cancer would be a sign that smoking is not being promoted but criticized. Betty, however, is the most hated character in the series, and hence the cigarette comes to be seen as a “vigilante.” The other characters seem to have a promising future, even if they continue to smoke.
As these final reflections suggest, Mad Men: A Cultural History offers a stimulating point of view on the role of mass communication products as keys to understanding our society. In addition, the book also presents a great example of a methodological course for conducting popular culture research.
