How a psychologist thinks about your favorite Film & TV characters.
Betty Draper Francis (January Jones) finally takes a stand in Mad Men Season 7 Episode 5 – and weren’t we all cheering? It’s 1969, after all, and the Women’s Movement is in full swing. Betty’s finally sick and tired of living under society’s expectations (not to mention her mother’s) about just what kind of woman …
Bob Dylan’s song, “The Times They Are A-Changin’” defined the 60’s and the Cultural Revolution taking place. These times were especially momentous for women in their roles in the workplace and as wives. Enter the world of Mad Men – and we are in the culture that fueled the fires for Friedan’s 1963 book, The Feminine Mystique. The Women’s …
Could Sterling, Cooper, and Partners of Mad Men fame be an even worse environment for – and especially the women – as we enter Mad Men Season 7 in 1969? Each of the main characters seems poised for the struggle of their lives – as Mad Men’s psychologically-minded creator Matthew Weiner hints: “This season is …
Is there hope for love in Mad Men Season 7 Episode 2? Maybe between Don (Jon Hamm) and Sally (Kiernan Shipka). But, first of all, Don needs to stop lying – and, finally, in Mad Men Season 7 Episode 2, he’s beginning to come clean. You see, Don’s lies catch up to him when Sally …
Don Draper (Jon Hamm) has been running from his past through the last six seasons of Mad Men. At least, he’s tried his best – amidst flashbacks and his brother’s return. To me as a psychoanalyst, there’s no doubt he’s a traumatized man. A man using various methods, mostly affairs, and alcohol, to convince himself it’s …
Some people need someone to hate. In Jean-Paul Sartre’s essay, “Anti-Semite and Jew,” he says: “If the Jew did not exist, the anti-Semite would invent him.” I don’t think it’s a far leap to put the history of Blacks in America in the same category. The important question is why? Why does this need to …
