Matthew Weiner discusses Don's relationship with the waitress on "Mad Men" - EMMYTVLEGENDS.ORG

what we want to do was kind of take dawn on this journey I talked about Siddhartha let's really start taking things away from him let's really give him avenues to improve his life and show why they don't work here he is means he meets this waitress first of all what he really wants is he wants Rachel Menken the one that got away the life not lived the first thing is to do is to reflect on life's path right he cannot be with Rachel Menken she's gone he's been thinking about her who knows if we find out he might have been thinking about her all the time he doesn't know but it definitely seems coincidence that she was on his mind then he founds out that she's dead it definitely fits Dawn's pattern and grieving people's patterns that he has this anonymous sexual relationship with this waitress the fact that this waitress is in the same form as the woman when we showed on speed Ella T at the beginning of season seven with with Neve Campbell on the airplane the woman who is completely cut out of the cloth I mean we literally let's it let's build Don Draper's ideal woman right down to the fact that she's like sad there's a depth to that to the grieving and that Don's attracted to and the grieving people are attracted to each other I think Betty had it too and you know it doesn't matter if you believe it or not it's a fact it's really not up for debate not for everybody but it's not up for debate and so Don's fixation on this waitress and his impulsive pursuit of her and the revelation of her backstory which is grief and the fact that she says now she just closes it off it's a rejection that happens to him right when he is starting to cleanse himself of his old life right he realizes that he did wrong Megan he tries to assuage his guilt by buying her off with a million dollar check he is trying to start fresh there's nothing fresh about this relationship for him and I know it was confusing for people because I found out I mean we've been done with the show for a while but I have to acknowledge this in this thing that you know some day the daily relationship with the media will not matter but this is something that definitely even though I swore not to pay attention to any of it because the show was locked it was nothing I could do you're constantly on the defensive for your show and anyway people had a problem with the fact that we were wasting their time in these few remaining hours and that just was like stunning to make I was like just like give this a chance there is a point to this story and it's an interesting story on its own oh yeah no it's really interesting if it was a regular season I'd be interested in it but I mean you only got six episodes left I'm like so what's supposed to happen like what do you want oh you want to see like Don and Joan sleep together and then that doesn't work you want to see like everything you ever fantasize what happened on the show I'm not gonna do that I'm trying to maintain the reality of the show I'm not just turning it up to 100 so that you can you know get the your fantasy season of Mad Men because now that it's over you know in fact the weird thing is the last few episodes of the seat of the series matter the most in a way to keep the tone consistent or it will destroy what you felt all along that was my feeling like I don't want to just like go into some weird thing you know just to like satisfy that there were things I was curious about and there's you know we don't deliberately not resolve things I pay attention to what we think is important for Don so that story of knowing that I wanted him on the road knowing that I wanted him to shed his identity knowing that we I originally thought the waitress would happen out on the road and semi said they they're like we have done has to be part of the reason he goes out on the road and also it's like how much do you really want to buy himself it really ended up being like two and a half episodes but the way that the waitress paid off for me when he goes to her family and he's posing to be that guy when he walks out of that meeting that was just another one of those visual things that you write down you say I hope this works and Phil shot it really well the special effects are really good with the airplane you know with that we've heard Don talk about the fantasy of going on an airplane when they had Mohonk like you just don't want to be in that meeting you wouldn't be on that plane going somewhere so there were some things that had to be stripped away he had to deal with his his PTSD basically his shame for for for killing Don Draper and taking his name he had to deal with the fact that he was alone and that was of his own making he had to deal we had to deal with the fantasy that that Don has never shared but the but America does that the Heartland and the real people are the honest that that's these got to get out of New York City to be a really honest person it's not true never felt it to be true but it's part of American mythology yeah I'm just working stripping him away one piece at a time and realizing that from basically when they get swallowed up that those are his goodbyes but that's the going to be the last scene with with you know with Roger when he says you are okay and I also this is not a criticism of other shows but I want I did mind referencing earlier shows but I didn't want to like I didn't want the whole ending to be some reference to the beginning you

Channel: FoundationINTERVIEWS

Views: 50,482

Keywords: Television history, Interviews, Emmy TV Legends, emmytvlegends, tv, academy, interviews, Mad Men (TV Program), Matthew Weiner (TV Writer)

Id: 5LTvy6C0t3c

Length: 6min 17sec (377 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 07 2016