Matthew Weiner, AMC and the folks at Mad Men generally run a pretty tight ship when it comes to the flow of information about the program. But star Jon Hamm appears to have jumped the gun on a recent podcast, saying that the long-awaited return of the 1960s drama for Season 5 will be March 25.
AMC, which I’m guessing was saving the return-date announcement for its appearance at the Television Critics Association later this week, has made no official statement on the date, though the L.A. Times reports that sources have confirmed the date. A March return had been bruited about for a while, and it makes sense given AMC’s calendar, so the news is not exactly surprising. It’s just a peculiar slip, given how controlling the network and producer generally are about the advance release of even unsurprising information regarding the show. Last season, AMC, acting on Weiner’s instructions, stopped sending out advance screeners to critics after early reviews revealed the year the action resumed in Season 4. (Which shockingly, was somewhat after the action ended at the close of Season 3.)
Anyway, screeners or no screeners, and whether the show returns March 25 or somewhere near that, after nearly a year and a half I’m dying to see what’s going on as Don Draper and Co. move through the decade, in which the Vietnam War will soon become a quagmire and the flower-power movement will sweep America. But hey: You didn’t hear that from me.