Mad Men’s Jared Harris Talks Lane Pryce’s Suicide

A great blog post over at The Examiner contains Amy and Nancy Harrington’s interview with Jared Harris, who plays Lane Pryce on Mad Men. After what has to be one of the finest and most shocking Mad Men episodes in its history, and which led to my commentary in this video:

Jared Harris shares some interesting viewpoints and tidbits. Here’s a sample, with the first read being kind of difficult for this blogger, because it means that Harris is getting released from Mad Men and will be out of a job:

On Being Told Lane Pryce Was on His Way Out

“[Matt] told me after the read-through for Episode 10. After the read-throughs every episode he asks everyone to hang around so that he can speak to you and give you notes because he’s going to be working while shooting. He doesn’t always get down to the set.

“I could see he was leaving me for the last person. And then he said, ‘Let’s go up to my office,’ which I knew wasn’t a good sign. And then he offered me incredibly expensive brandy and then I was like I knew this wasn’t going to go well.

“And then he said, ‘So I have something I want to talk to you about.’ And I knew at that point. I went, ‘This doesn’t sound good.’ And he went, ‘No it’s not. I’m really sorry.’

“But he explained why he wanted to do it. And he’s really been building up to it for the season. And I could see, from an acting point of view, it was to my benefit to go out with a bang rather than a whimper.

“At the same time I know that ‘Mad Men’ is just getting bigger and bigger as it builds towards Season 7. There’s already an obsession with the episode of Season 7. And I’m sad that I won’t be a part of that of that build of the show.

“But then again I joined late. So there’s no reason why I should be. I’m very, very lucky to have been a part of it.”

On Lane’s Choice To End It All in the SCDP Offices

“It was vindictive. He was angry and it was an expression of his anger. It was a passive-aggressive act… And the passive side of that was in the brilliantly placed suicide note, which explains nothing. So he’s trying to dig a hole for the people, particularly Don, to make them feel bad about what he’s done. It was a cowardly thing to do. He did it to try and hurt them the way that he feels that they’ve hurt him.”

Read the entire interview by Amy and Nancy Harrington here:

http://www.examiner.com/article/mad-men-s-jared-harris-discusses-the-demise-of-lane-pryce-part-ii

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