Photo by Albert Wilking
Last Wednesday night, I put on my
form-fitting gray vintage dress and headed out to a Mad Men–themed
party at The Gates bar in Chelsea. Upon entering, I noted
that, for once, the boys had played dress-up as well as the girls. In a
testament to the show’s pull on masculine imaginations, imitation Don
Drapers in vests and fedoras were cracking jokes, drinking Old
Fashioneds and anachronistically answering their cell phones throughout
the chandelier-lit space.
“He’s gorgeous and he’s married and has sex with whoever he wants,” explained one partygoer. “Who wouldn’t want that power?” Clad in red vintage dress, lipstick and those pervasive black-frame glasses, artist and writer Susan McIntosh scowled and grimaced through a series of photos. “It’s fun to subvert the beauty paradigm,” she giggled.Who was her favorite character on the show? “Joan Holloway,” she answered with no hesitation. “She’s the sexy secretary, she’s got a bombshell body and she kicks ass.” Then, going beyond aesthetics, she added, “It’s a good societal critique, and it has a lot of things we have to deal with today.” Changing the subject, she began to excoriate a gaggle of “bad New Jersey mall characters” whose hair extensions and bottle service marked them as such. “I want all those people to lose their jobs and for New York to be cool again.”
Tattooed temptress Friday Jones was more charitable toward the terminally un-hip masses. “I think [Mad Men] is going to have a good influence on style,” she theorized. “I’m imaging all these pencil skirts and A-line dresses... thank God for AMC.”
Andrew, of twins-in-love DJ outfit Andrew Andrew, agreed. “I hope people are watching it in Oklahoma because maybe it’ll give them better style.” Pulling me into a quieter alcove, he told me how much he and the other Andrew, currently on laptop duties, liked the show. “We started watching it from day one. It’s such a smart show, it’s amazing how popular it is. It’s so different from reality TV.”
Back over by the bar, blogger Drew Grant shared the Andrews’ enthusiasm for the night’s theme. “I love Mad Men, and I love free alcohol. I’m drunk at noon every day, just like the people on that show.”
