Confessions of a Mad (Men) Man.

They say confession is good for the soul. So here goes:

As a somewhat Mad Men type guy myself, a CD/writer type who worked at a major agency on accounts including  BP, Red Roof Inns, Bennigans, Steak and Ale, Mazda, Kroger, Meijer, etc. and now at a smaller agency where I am a partner working on local and regional accounts (sound familiar?), I love watching Mad Men becuase it echos (if somewhat distantly) the real world of advertising.

Now here's the confession part: I DVR-ed the 2-hour season premier of "Mad Men" and purposly started watching 20 minutes late so that I could zip past the commercials. I must be "Mad!!!" Here I am, a guy who makes his living and his career off of commercials, watching a show about people who make commercials, and I didn't watch the commercials! 

Ah, there, I feel better. Now I did pay attention closely as I zipped past the commercials and noted that there wasn't a single one that I hadn't seen before (I watch a lot of TV). But the bigger point is this -- when a TV commercial is crammed into a 4-minute commercial break, even a pro-commercial person like myself has a hard time staying tuned in, let alone the multitude of folks who could give a crap. 

My solution is to have fewer commercials per break. The human mind can only store so many messages at a time, anyway. So have fewer commercials, charge more to air them (clients will scream at first, until they understand that there is more of a chance people will actually watch them), and make Mad Men and Mad Women TV viewers a little less mad! 

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Comments

[Steeb]

Greg, yes you are mad. Personally, I like watching the commercials and I like having the time to do other things during the show - I feel somewhat productive. That "What" short was great. I agree with Russ, Jon Ham did it so well you never noticed any repetitiveness.

[Russ Tate]

Less is more! What? Jon Hamm is truly awesome. There is probably no other actor on the planet who could put so much meaning and emotion into one little word on such a regular basis.