The Return of Don Draper
After nine years, Don Draper is back... and selling Pop-Tarts to Jerry Seinfeld?
During the 2023 Super Bowl, I remember watching an ad for Hellman’s Mayonaise and joking, “This may be the closest we get to seeing Don Draper again.”
A play on Hamm’s last name, Hellmann’s ad reminded me of the ending monologue of Mad Men’s finale in which Don Draper listens to a man describe his dream where he is standing on the shelf of a refrigerator.
I do not believe the reference was intentional but I laughed and thought “Don is having those same dreams.”
There was an odd feeling that I would love to see Don Draper again but an equal comfort knowing his story is concluded. Don will always remain in our memories smiling on a hilltop as he dreams up the next great ad. As much as we miss him, no one has answered how he should return.
I never would have believed that the man with an answer was Jerry Seinfeld.
Unfrosted, Jerry Seinfeld’s cinematic follow-up to Bee Movie (2007), dropped on Netflix last week after three years of “Can you believe they’re making a Pop-Tarts movie” buzz. For years, Jerry has lived with the curse of being asked “How do you top Seinfeld?” A show about nothing became the definitive sitcom of all time. Its finale, which left most fans unsatisfied, created an expectation that Jerry had to redeem himself.
That’s not who Jerry is. He made Bee Movie, people. His joke is often that the joke is being played on the audience.
76 million viewers want a satisfying conclusion to Seinfeld? We’re not going to do that, they’re going to jail.
Looking for a fun, animated movie to watch with the kids? Here is a courtroom drama starring a cartoon bee that will break the impressionable minds of children to the point that they have a meme text of the script ready to post on social media at all times.
Enjoying the new wave of corporation movies such as Air, Tetris, and Blackberry that recreate a stylized history of the products you know and love? Well, here is Unfrosted where Tony the Tiger organizes a January 6th on Kellogg’s.
Jerry is a perfectionist who doesn’t believe in perfection. He knows that some elements of comedy will be unsatisfying and embraces that feeling like in the finale of Seinfeld. When asked what was the best finale to any show, he said nothing comes close to Mad Men.1
I joked about watching Unfrosted only because it takes place in the 1960s and stars Jon Hamm and John Slattery. A Mad Men fan eating sand in the desert after nine years off the air. It wasn’t until right before I watched the movie that I considered Seinfeld had used his influence to bring Don Draper and Roger Sterling back to us.
The film Unfrosted is an “exaggerated” 1960s-set, origin story of the Pop-Tart toaster pastry. To help name their product, Kellogg’s employee Bob Cabana (Seinfeld) and his team (Jim Gaffigan and Melissa McCarthy) take a meeting with two Madison Avenue ad men.
Legally, these two mad men are not the Mad Men known as Don and Roger… which is confusing because John Slattery is referred to as Roger in the movie.
Seinfeld did not secure the rights to the characters but, as a friend of Jon Hamm and John Slattery, did get them to appear in the roles of Ad Man #1 and Ad Man #2 as they are listed in the credits. I’m sure he would have loved to call the character who is clearly Don Draper by his name but realized that didn’t matter. If we see Jon Hamm doing an ad pitch and using his charm on a woman then that is Don Draper.
Hamm has embraced comedy roles in his post-Mad Men years to create a distinction from Don. Interestingly, Seinfeld brought the character back because Mad Men is so funny. In an interview with Collider, Seinfeld said that the Mad Men characters fit in the movie’s world not just because it is the 1960s but because it is ridiculous.2 Mad Men features many almost surreal plotlines that outdo the insanity seen in Unfrosted, Tony the Tiger January 6th withstanding.
What some feel may cheapen the characters into a Super Bowl commercial joke represents why many of us became invested in the show - it is damn funny. We love these characters and want to see them on our screens.
It is unknown if series creator Matthew Weiner was involved in the talks. As the rights were never cleared and this serves as a punchline made nine years after a satisfying conclusion, I have to imagine not.
My thoughts go to Logan (2017) director James Mangold’s tweet after learning that the character of Wolverine, whom he gave a satisfying conclusion, would return in the crude comedy Deadpool & Wolverine (2024).
So, the big question for this Substack run by an obsessive and overanalyzing Mad Men fan. What do I think of these cameos?
Unfrosted itself will not surprise anyone. I have already had a few friends tell me how their parents adored it, especially the Mad Men scene. Those I know who hate it went in with the attitude anyway. You probably know if you’re going to enjoy it and the only surprises in store are the celebrity cameos which have mostly been spoiled already.
Committing to a bit in a Jerry Seinfeld joke movie does not cheapen these characters. This is now a fun trivia question to ask at Mad Men trivia night, I’m not going to be watching Season 4’s iconic episode “The Suitcase” and fuming that Jerry Seinfeld made Don Draper sell sexy Pop-Tarts. That’s no way to appreciate art. You would go mad if you thought of a Super Bowl parody commercial each time you watched an iconic film or TV series it drew from.
This scene plays into Jerry’s “What did you expect?” comedy style which Hamm can thrive in. Slattery plays the straight man, very much the Roger Sterling we know while Hamm hams it up. You’re seeing a distorted Don Draper stuck in a time loop of the 1960s, a caricature that has accepted insanity.
Ad Man #1 pitches Seinfeld’s team a sensual product called Jelle Joile, a parody of the Belle Joile lipstick company prominently seen in Season One. This parody grows more insane when you consider that a film about a toasted product chooses not to reference Don Draper’s most widely known pitch “It’s Toasted.”
It’s as if Seinfeld was saying “This one is for the Mad Men fans, not just people who saw the pilot.” In his defense, if I had that kind of money and influence I would also be using it to make Mad Men fanfiction.
An inevitable sadness watching the pitch is that Jon Hamm and John Slattery are older. Again, it’s a fun and harmless parody but imagine it is May 2015. The incredible series finale of Mad Men just aired and you tell passionate and emotional fans that Don Draper will return in a movie in 2024.
Almost everyone is going to think that there is a Sally Draper film set on the verge of the 1980s that kickstarts a decade-spanning TV series focused on her. If you explain “Actually, he’s being directed by Jerry Seinfeld in a Pop-Tart movie” people will throw things. There is an irony that a character who was given a satisfying finale has been brought back by someone who made one of the most famously unsatisfying finales of all time.
Nine years removed from Mad Men’s final episode, I am fine with some harmless laughs but you can’t help wondering if this is the last time we will see Ad Man #1.
Do we want to see Don Draper again?
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