Karl Klockars

Preface:  Yes, I am blithering a tremendous amount about Vegas.  Yes, I will stop soon.  I just need to get it out of my system and then we’ll be fine.  I’m detoxing in 3 new inches of Chicago snow and you will forgive me my mental vacations back to the desert, won’t you?  Thank you.

In a swirling perfect storm of happenstance, I spent most of my afternoon yesterday camped out on the couch watching Mad Men via the magic of On Demand cable programming.  This was the result of coming home to a sick wife who split work to drink NyQuil and zonk out in the hopes of a quick recovery.  (NyQuil + couch is how I otherwise spend most of my weekends regardless.  It’s like time travel!)

This reminded me of a plan I was formulating during my 5 Days In Vegas.  As you wander up and down the Strip today, you get the vibe that you’re smack dab in the middle of a gargantuan theme park.  A theme park for adults where half-naked men and women take the place of funnel cakes, but a themepark nonetheless.  This is in direct contrast to the retro-Americana swingin’ Rat Pack vibe which almost everyone envisions Vegas to be, even though it hasn’t really been like that for decades.

Yes, places like the Sahara and the Riviera still exist and are hanging onto that old-school setup (or more likely, can’t afford to make all the renovations they’d like to) but all the same, those casino hotel resorts like the Dunes and the Sands are not much more than memories upon which representations of New York and Paris stand today.

Here’s where you come in, Staff of AMC’s hit tv show “Mad Men.”  I haven’t been paying too much attention to the trades lately so I don’t know if you guys are writing or in production or taking 18 months off in between seasons like your forbearers on “The Sopranos” had done.  All I know is that Jon Hamm either still has or at one point had a beard.  Either way, here’s a little something to wrap your 60′s-centric brains around.

The idea of the Rat Pack era of Vegas is iconic Americana.  “Mad Men” has become iconic in its own right.  So…what does  a brother have to do to get the fine new creators of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce to hit up a convention in classic 1964 era Las Vegas?  I know you can picture it now – the classic photo of the Rat Pack in front of the Sands…imagine how many posters you’d sell if you put Don Draper, Pete Campbell, Roger Sterling and the lovely Joan Holloway standing in front of that same sign, smokes alight and highball glasses in hand?  You’d bankroll the whole damned season, that’s how many.

I know you’ve done the “travel for a convention” storyline before.  But I wouldn’t worry about people thinking that you’re going back to the well a little too soon.  After all, conventions happen every year. Who’s to say that your cadre of advertising executives can’t come up with a reason to head out to the desert to get a little sun, make a few deals and chase some showgirls?

That mid-sixties era was also really the golden age of Vegas kitchiness.  Viva Las Vegas was released that year.  Robin and the Seven Hoods came out.  The original Ocean’s Eleven was just four years old at that point.  I am well aware of the dedication to detail that the art department is forced to adhere to.  It will not be easy to bring back that era.  But it can be done.

For starters, you’ve got an entire stretch of Las Vegas that is pretty much preserved in amber on Fremont street.  Even the people who visit those casinos are still locked in 1964 even if their bodies have continued to age.  That’s step one.  Step two is to once again imagine how bitchin’ it would be to watch the cast sauntering down a digitally youthful Fremont – with no goofy rooftop up above blasting Kiss songs down at you.

Step three is to set up camp at the Sahara at the very north end of the Strip.  They’re still old-school as hell, they’d probably happily trade the time you spent taking up space for the resurgence in income they’d get after the publicity they got for hosting your filming.  Also, there’s pretty much jack shit around there since all the stuff they wanted to build just up and died when the economy went to hell, so there’s less to erase from all your backgrounds.

Beyond that, your cast is already on board – hell, they went and did a musical revue in Vegas last year which seems to have been a hell of a lot of fun.  Don’t you think they’d like to go back and build more of a mythology around the show in the vein of a Mad Pack sort of debauchery? It’s really a no-brainer.  It’s like peanut butter and jelly.  It’s peppermint and chocolate.  It’s sour cream and chives.  Mad Men and Vegas is two great tastes that go great together.

And really, we’re all staring down the barrel of another summer of Staycations, so if we can travel vicariously to the distant past of America’s Playground through you guys, it’d really be doing us all a huge favor.

Think about it, won’t you?