There are two popular Mad Men parodies on the Internet: The Simpsons and Sesame Street. This is the Sesame Street one and it’s pretty funny. I like how they bang their hands on the table after each time they suggest an idea. Not sure where they got that from because they don’t do that in the show. Maybe that’s a substitute for taking a drink. They drink about that often. Another thing that’s funny is that they are “Mad” men because they aren’t happy. But we know that “Mad Men” is a play on words because most of the advertising agencies were located on Madison Avenue in Manhattan in the 1960s. It also sounds like “Ad” which of course is short of Advertising. Anyway I think it’s really funny.

I had come across this before a while ago but forgot where I’d found it. Boing Boing had a wonderful excerpt about the props on Mad Men and how things have changed over the years. There is also another site where they talk about more of the inconsistencies with the props. I’ll try to find that for you guys.

“The Collectors Weekly published a fascinating interview with Scott Buckwald, the original prop master for Mad Men. Buckwald is a fascinating character and his work on Mad Men is obsessively awesome. For Mad Men, Buckwald and his team sought out vintage taxicab meters, constructed lipstick display cases, printed TV Guides of the era, reproduced a 1960 Sara Lee cherry cheesecake box, and even cooked hamburgers that matched the time period. From The Collectors Weekly:
Collectors Weekly: When it came to the Mad Men office scenes, did you have to get vintage typewriters and pencils and pens?”

Buckwald: Well, pencils are pencils. There’s no change in the pencils, and a lot of offices were using ballpoint pens. Fountain pens had largely disappeared. Certainly for formal use, the fountain pen was still there, but not as an everyday office tool.

I thought Mad Men made a big mistake on the typewriters. They knew what the right history was, but they ignored it. The secretaries at that advertising firm would have still been using vintage-style typewriters, but they used IBM Selectrics simply because the producer liked the way they looked and they made less noise on set. So we got many letters about how they were wrong, but, again, that’s his call. And right or wrong, it’s his show. He can do whatever he wants with it.

There was a typewriter repairman in North Hollywood, California. He couldn’t believe it when all of a sudden someone deposited 24 vintage typewriters on his doorstep and said, “Make them look new.” He probably hadn’t had that much work in the last 25 years. He was probably just about ready to hang up the “Going out of business” sign and cursing the arrival of the laptop computer when all of a sudden here I come with 24 typewriters…

Collectors Weekly: If someone is drinking Coca-Cola in Mad Men, would you have to get the actual Coca-Cola bottle from 1960? Buckwald: Yes. Vintage Coca-Cola bottles are pretty easy to get, so I would get the bottles, fill them up with Coke, and use a bottle capper to press the original caps back on. We did an episode when the first canned Coca-Cola was coming out. Coke was trying to promote its first cans, but they were nothing like today’s cans. There’s nothing similar to it. Even the material of the can was different. It was steel as opposed to aluminum. So I had to remake the original Coke can, which was a blast.

Believe or not, we actually found a peanut jar in the New York area that was the same size and shape of a Coke can. It was metal on the top but the sides were cardboard. We made a decal of a Coke label and wrapped it around the jar. By the touch, you could tell that it wasn’t made out of metal, but on camera it looked like a metal Coke can.

It’s always turning one thing into another. That’s what I love about doing this. It’s always last-minute thinking and being innovative–being the mad scientist. It never gets boring because everything is different. In Mad Men, I was a 1960s advertising executive. In The Prestige, I was a 1890s magician. In You Again, I’m a 2009 wedding planner. I’ve been a policeman. I’ve been a doctor. I’ve been a lawyer. I’ve been a gynecologist. I get to step into other people’s lives.

Here is a photo of the office.  I sit in the back right near Don’s desk.

Here is a photo of some of our employees near the front door.

Q: I want to wear the style of retro clothes and suits that are on the “Mad Men” TV series. How can I dress like that so I look really cool and not like I am wearing a costume?

The goal: emulating the styles of “Mad Men”
A: Fashion is at its most intriguing when it focuses on novelties, styles that look new—or fresh because we haven’t seen them in a while. That is now working to the advantage of the business suit. Most guys don’t go much dressier these days than a sport coat, a blazer or perhaps a black suit with an open collar.

So viewers of “Mad Men” just can’t get enough of all those sharply dressed characters in suits at Sterling Cooper, the show’s fictional Madison Avenue ad agency. The spiffy men’s suits on the show are varied—including glen plaids, herringbones and pinstripes—and they’re worn with crisp white shirts, skinny ties, fedoras and top coats.

At the same time, the show’s 1960s styles are in keeping with some trends in menswear today, such as flat-front pants and jackets with higher armholes, skinnier lapels and double vents. “Men’s suit styles have dramatically changed in the past couple of years, and the styling of the late ’50s and ’60s, as well as designers like Thom Browne, has been influential,” says Guy Voglino, divisional merchandise manager at Brooks Brothers. Last month, Brooks Brothers, which custom-designed suits for the actors on the show, introduced a limited-edition run of light gray sharkskin “Mad Men” suits.

The narrow silhouette is key; look for “a trimmer feeling and a jacket that is about a half-inch shorter,” Mr. Voglino says. If you take time to find the right suit for your body type, he adds, you won’t run the risk of looking like you just walked off a movie set.

Still, it’s possible to take the retro look too far: Are you really comfortable in a Borsalino hat? And go easy with the Brylcreem.

This is our first post but be sure to know that we are going to have lots of Mad Men photos, news, and character summaries.

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