Conrad Hilton ~ A Casual Observation of a ‘Mad Men’ Character

I’m sure I’m not alone in liking the AMC show ‘Mad Men.’  It is about an ad agency in the early 60’s on Madison Avenue.  Suffice to say that the main character, Don Draper, is a handsome Ken doll of a self-made ad man.  If one didn’t know about his screwed up back story, one might mistake him for someone who stepped out of an Ayn Rand novel.  There is a lot to be said about ‘Mad Men’ but it isn’t going to be said here.  What has me laughing this season is that one of the supporting characters is Conrad Hilton who I think the writers must be having too much fun writing dialogue for him.

                Here’s the deal, Conrad Hilton (the real deal) was very much an Ayn Rand type of guy himself, except he liked to read his Bible and, according to a side comment in ‘Mad Men’ believed in the Marshal Plan; i.e. American charity (charity and religion weren’t very Rand like).  He is very much a 24/7 type of guy who has given Draper a speech that he is hard on everyone, but most of all himself.  Often he calls Draper’s home at eleven at night even though he knows Draper has a wife and three kids, one of which is an infant.  In one recent episode, he was angry that Draper didn’t have any advertisement for a Hilton hotel on the moon despite the fact that America had yet to land on it.  As you can tell, Conrad Hilton, despite his somewhat shoddy marriage record  (which included a brief marriage to Zsa Zsa Gabor in the mid-1950’s)  was very much a man who had a Protestant work ethic, even though I think he was Catholic.  Thus, I find it humorous that the main face of Hilton brand today is great-granddaughter Paris Hilton.        

                Despite my many uses of Paris Hilton as a political point in articles before, I really don’t have anything against her.  I don’t think she is a genius by any stretch of the imagination, but on the other hand, I do think that she is a tad smarter than her public persona would otherwise dictate.  I try to picture what it must be like for the writers of the show to have Conrad utter lines about thinking of Draper as almost a son of his because they have shared experiences of making their ways into the world while in comparison Conrad’s sons have had a totally different reality while growing up (his eldest, Nicky Hilton, was the first husband of Elizabeth Taylor who was rumored to have been physically abusive toward her).  You could tell by the way Conrad’s character spoke the dialogue that he thought his sons were weaker because of their life of luxury.    

                Yet here we are, 2009 going on 2010, and the name Hilton is synonymous with lazy luxury and still there isn’t even one Hilton hotel on the moon.

                I just thought it was worthy of a comment.

Westerfield © 2009