Note: This spot was written to promote Mad Men on AMC for Loyalkaspar, a NYC-based agency.
The Ad Makes the Man
Info-Graphic Spot
This spot is a brilliant distillation of all that advertising is, and as such, all that Don Draper is, and all that Mad Men is. The style of this spot is graphic collage- in the style of advertisements from the 1960s. It is a cut-and-paste world, when cut-and-paste meant literally to cut with scissors and affix with paste.
| Video | Audio |
| Don Draper stands in front of two dusty looking clients. | Client One: So have you figured out a way to work the wheel into it?
Client 2: We know it’s hard because wheels aren’t really seen as exciting technology, even though they are the original. |
| As Don begins talking the world is transformed into an ever-evolving montage of 1960s ads, with himself, and the characters from the show as the subjects.
Don’s home life in the suburbs in ads for Kodak home movie cameras. Don’s office persona in ads for slick suits and high end cars, and office décor. Don’s many affairs in cologne and whiskey ads. Don’s crisis of confidence and performance anxiety in ads for headache remedies. Etc. |
Don Draper: Well, technology is a glittering lure. But, uh, there is the rare occasion when the public can be engaged on a level beyond flash, if they have a sentimental bond with the product.
My first job, I was in-house at a fur company, with this old-pro copywriter, a Greek named Teddy. Teddy told me the most important idea in advertising is new. Creates an itch. You simply put your product in there as a kind of calamine lotion. But he also talked about a deeper bond with the product. Nostalgia. It’s delicate, but potent. Sweetheart. Teddy told me that in Greek, “nostalgia” literally means “the pain from an old wound”. It’s a twinge in your heart far more powerful than memory alone. This device isn’t a spaceship, it’s a time machine. It goes backwards, forwards, takes us to a place where we ache to go again. It’s not called the wheel. It’s called the carousel. It lets us travel the way a child travels… |
| The scene concludes with the awestruck and adoring clients gazing at the triumphant Don.
End Tag: AMC (logo) Something More |
Don Draper: Round and around, and back home again, to a place where we know we are loved. |