KILL YOUR ENTHUSIASM (1)

By: Max Alvarez
October 2, 2022

One in a series of 25 enthusiastic posts, contributed by 25 HILOBROW friends and regulars, on the topic of favorite killed-off TV characters. Series edited by Heather Quinlan.

LANE PRYCE | MAD MEN

Something was definitely off that morning in the offices of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce. Calculating office manager Joan Halloway (Christina Hendricks) was informed by a secretary that Lane Pryce’s office door was locked. Pete Campbell (Vincent Kartheiser), the youthful, privileged, and pompous, agency partner, decided to investigate. Peering over the dividing wall of an office adjacent to Lane’s, Pete, in a rare show of humanity, covered his mouth with a horrified expression.

Lane Pryce (Jared Harris), the amiable British partner in the 1960s advertising agency, had hanged himself in his office.

This shattering event occurred in Season 5 / Episode 12 of Mad Men, “Commissions and Fees,” an episode I’ll never forget.

Lane’s downfall was assured after agency partner Bertram Cooper (Robert Morse) discovered a $7,500 cancelled check to Lane signed by Don Draper (Jon Hamm). Only Don didn’t sign the check — Lane forged it in order to pay off British back taxes to cover the recent sale of his stock portfolio. Foolish Lane used the sale to invest in Sterling Cooper after the agency lost its lucrative Lucky Strike account.

The scene in Draper’s office where Don confronts Lane about the embezzlement is painful to watch, thanks in no small part to brilliant acting turns by Harris and Hamm. Lane’s pathetic groveling (“Please reconsider!”) is no match for Don’s tortured stoicism (“I’m sorry. I can’t trust you.”). Lane’s pleas on behalf of economic injustice (“That 7,500 is nothing to you. Do you know how the rest of us live?”) fall on deaf ears. In short, Lane must resign. He must decide upon an “elegant exit” from the agency.

With its cynical take on the heartless world of 1960s advertising, Mad Men predictably was populated with intriguing but morally dubious characters. Men and women who would turn on a dime if it meant serious career advancement or the landing of a highly desirable corporate client. But I could not help but take a shine to the tormented Lane Pryce.

This British fish-out-of-water possessed an awkward gentlemanly demeanor which served to camouflage a lonely and tortured soul. Lane struck me as a well-meaning ad man who was attempting to bring civility to the tobacco smoke-filled battlefields of LBJ-era Madison Avenue. He seemed to me a decent enough chap who eventually succumbed to the greed and arrogance of American business. Lane Pryce was desperate to belong but knew he never could.

It was therefore impossible for me not to empathize with tragic Lane, from his clumsy attempts to woo the much-lusted-after Joan to his embarrassing telephone flirtations with a young woman whose wallet he found in a taxi. Poor Lane even failed at his initial efforts at suicide in the front seat of his brand-new Jaguar.

After Lane Pryce finally made his “elegant exit” in Season 5 of Mad Men, Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce rebounded. I, on the other hand, am still recovering from the loss.

***

MORE ENTHUSIASM at HILOBROW

KILL YOUR ENTHUSIASM (1)

Categories

Tags