Episode Report Card Couch Baron: B+ | 10 USERS: A YOU GRADE IT Where Have You Gone, Dick Whitman?
By Couch Baron | Season 1 | Episode 6 | Aired on 2007.08.23
In Don's office, he, Pete, Salvatore, and Paul are having a brainstorming session about the Israel campaign and the problems the violence endemic to the region present. Pete suggests pushing the danger as an "adventure in travel" angle, and I get what he's saying but I think most people would opt for a safari instead. I mean, at least you're the one holding the gun, right? Salvatore suggests a parting of the Red Sea yielding a resort idea, and if I didn't reject that on taste principles alone, I'd certainly kibosh it on the grounds that most people don't go on vacation to wander the desert for forty years. There's discussion of kibbutzes and Communism and the creation of the Israeli state that doesn't really go anywhere, and then Salvatore suggests that Israel's biggest asset is that the people are hot. The meeting breaks up without any resolution, and I know attitudes were different back then, but if I have to sit through two minutes of blatant racism, I at least want a pithy ad slogan for my trouble. We switch to an exterior shot as the boys file out, and Don asks Peggy for a private line and closes his office door. Back inside, he dials…
…and we cut to Rachel, who looks chagrined once someone informs her via intercom that Don is calling for her. She eventually answers, and Don expresses the desire to meet up with her. She's extremely reluctant, but he tells her it's important, so she agrees to lunch the next day in the tea room at the Pierre. I hope that's not where Joan and Roger conduct their assignations, because that would make for one awkward afternoon back at the office. When they hang up, Rachel looks pensive, and Don goes back to looking at the photo of the Israeli woman on the magazine cover.
Back from the break, Betty is starting to get undressed for bed and making offhand comments to Don, who's reading Exodus and clearly not really listening to her. Yup, she's got him, all right. She attracts his attention, however, by saying the first boy she ever kissed was Jewish. It seems pretty clear at this point that the first boy you married was also Jewish, the usage of "was" being significant rather than lazy in this case. Don perks up, and asks how that happened, and apparently, one of Betty's childhood pals had a Jewish friend, and she invited them to a charity fundraiser at her synagogue. A boy named David Rosenberg (I personally have known two of those) danced with her all night. Don asks if he was a good kisser, which between most couples would seem light and normal but is oddly creepy coming from him, and Betty responds that she thinks he had had a lot more practice than she. The next day, Beth, the Jewish girl, told everyone Betty was necking with David Rosenberg, which I guess means that if Betty knows only one Yiddish word, it's got to be yenta. Betty finishes the story by saying that the girls all gave her looks, but were all blondes by the next summer. So…they all wanted to make out with David Rosenberg? He must have been a really good kisser. Not speaking of which, Betty leans in and kisses Don for a bit, but when she realizes he's not even as into it as Salvatore would be, she stops. Don tells her it's hot, and he has to read the book, and Betty too-brightly agrees. She tries to save a little face by suggesting they get an air conditioner in the bedroom, but Don noncommittally replies, "We'll see." Betty heads into the bathroom, probably to silently castigate herself. As well she should -- directly telling your spouse you want to be with him is no way to conduct yourself in marriage! Also, Don's kind of a dick.