Real ‘Mad Men’ read Meditations in an Emergency

By Daily News Editor

Published: July 28, 2008

Critics, fans and web junkies are going nuts about the season premiere of "Madmen" and how broody marketing genius Don Draper (Jon Hamm) is influenced by an encounter with a stranger reading Frank O’Hara’s "Meditations in an Emergency" in a bar. (Remember, this is the Sixties.) 

Draper tells the stranger he feels guilty about having lunch in a bar, not getting anything done. The stranger says with a barely perceptible sneer, "Yeah, it’s all about getting things done."

Draper asks, "Is it good?"

Stranger says, "I don’t think you’d like it."

Cut.

[If Martin Scorsese were directing we'd hear a blaring track of Bob Dylan singing "The Times They Are A-Changin' " at this point. But we don't. There's no music. And that's why we — and all the critics — love "Mad Men" so much.]

At the end of  the episode we see Draper reading "Meditations in an Emergency," walking to a mailbox to send a copy of the book to an unknown person (presumably his forbidden lover) and reciting the words to himself as though he were beginning to decode a secret road map to his own life.

Within minutes of the broadcast, "Meditations in an Emergency" was the top search on Google. Volcanic.

Prediction: All new and used copies of Frank O’Hara’s collection of poems will be sold out on Amazon by the middle of the week.