As with any TV finale with even a hint of ambiguity, the “Mad Men” ending has been discussed and debated over and over in the 10 years since it first aired. So on Saturday, May 31, when Jon Hamm and John Slattery took part in a 10-year anniversary celebration of the series finale at Austin’s ATX Television Festival, it was no surprise when the first audience question was whether Hamm considers Don Draper’s cliffside epiphany to be “cynical” or “optimistic” in spirit.
“I think it depends on how you feel about… advertising,” Hamm said, drawing a laugh from the crowd. “Because I think really what Don’s journey of shedding all this stuff and moving as far as he can away from what was his home, which was on the opposite end of the country — he literally went until there was no more land left, there was no place left to run, as far away as he could from his life, and realized that his life was creating advertising. That was his revelation. That this is what he is and what he does. He’s not Dick Whitman, he’s not Don Draper, he’s some version of this: He is an advertising man. And that was, I think, positive.”
Earlier in the panel, which was moderated by Noah Hawley, Hamm said the most difficult part of shooting the final season — which saw his character flee New York in a long, solo, cross-country drive to California — was in how his emotional journey mirrored Don’s.
“The thing that most bummed me out was when I realized at some point that Don’s going to be gone from the main cast for like five episodes. I’m basically going to not be working with this friend group that I established over the last 10 years,” Hamm said. “I’m going to be kind of on my own, working with day players and guest stars — amazing actors all — but people who I don’t know [during] this incredibly emotional time that we’re ending the show. I really had a hard time with that. Of course, in retrospect, I’m like, that’s perfect. What better way to feel the isolation and loneliness of this character’s journey than to be like, ‘You’ve got nobody left. You’re on the road by yourself.’”
Another audience question — about whether the actors ever had any hesitancy about what their characters were doing — led Slattery to revisit a controversial episode where Roger Sterling wore blackface.
“I got a script and I had to sing ‘My Old Kentucky Home’ in blackface,” Slattery said. “And I called him [Jon Hamm], and I said, ‘Would you do this?’ And he said, ‘You mean, would I do it, or would I do it?’ And I think what he meant was, ‘Look, you rode the girl in singing cowboy songs, like, where are you going to draw the line?’”
“That was a day,” Hamm said.
“Then when we had to shoot the scene, I felt like yes, this is probably something that occurred and it’s probably something this character would have done, so what leg do I have to stand on not to do it? So I got all dressed up in the outfit, got in the van, and drove to this place and the first person who opened the van was a very large African-American Los Angeles motorcycle cop who was helping me open the door. We were face to face, and he stood back and [looked at me]. I said, [sheepishly] ‘Hi, how’s it going?’ and then had to go sing that thing in front of him and everyone. […] So yeah, there was some protectiveness felt, but there was a reason for everything he wanted you to do.”
When “Mad Men” made its ad-supported streaming debut in 2020, IMDB TV included a disclaimer on Season 3, Episode 3, “My Old Kentucky Home,” which read: “This episode contains disturbing images related to race in America. One of the characters is shown in blackface as part of an episode that shows how commonplace racism was in America in 1963. In its reliance on historical authenticity, the series producers are committed to exposing the injustices and inequities within our society that continue to this day so we can examine even the most painful parts of our history in order to reflect on who we are today and who we want to become. We are therefore presenting the original episode in its entirety.”
Hamm echoed those sentiments on Saturday while explaining the series’ need for “verisimilitude.”
“‘Problematic’ is a word that’s become very in vogue for good reason, because so much of the past is problematic when viewed in the lens of 2025, for sure — it’s how we learn, and it’s a wonderful thing to learn,” Hamm said. “I remember at some point having a conversation with executives at AMC, and they said, ‘Do they have to smoke?’ And Matt [Weiner] was like, ‘Are you fucking kidding me? Yes. They literally have to. They’re addicted to cigarettes.’”
“We had to lean into the good, the bad, and the ugly of all of it, understanding [how it will be seen] in this lens of the now. Part of it was representation of Black people in the ’60s. Like, why aren’t there any Black people in here? Well, there are, you just don’t see them because they were not seen — that’s not great. But the verisimilitude is there.”
Other fond — and not so fond — memories shared at the 75-minute panel included:
• A former high school classmate of Hamm’s showed him a yearbook photo of the two of them on the swim team together and asked if Don Draper’s distinct way of swimming was because of the “very particular, unusual way” their instructor taught them. “I mean, you don’t unlearn how to swim,” Hamm said.
• Hamm and Slattery said, on the first day of shooting “Mad Men,” there was a “dead body” in the parking lot.
“Scene one, day one, there was a dead body in the parking lot, but that’s a story for another day,” Hamm said.
“That’s true,” Slattery said. “First day of work, a guy fell off a bridge, and he was in the parking lot, face down. I saw a foot.”
• Slattery said when he first directed an episode of “Mad Men” (Season 4, Episode 4, “The Rejected”), Elisabeth Moss didn’t offer him the warmest of receptions.
“The first person I had to direct was Lizzie [Moss],” Slattery said. “By this time, it was Season 4, so we were pretty slotted as to who we were and how to play the scenes, and this was 6:30 or 7 in the morning. […] I said, ‘So,’ and she looked at me and goes, ‘Ha ha ha!’ She laughed in my face. Then she goes, ‘I can’t, I just can’t.’ And she walked away!”
