John Slattery on the Mad Men Scene He Wishes They’d Kept

NEW YORK, NY - MARCH 02: John Slattery attends Atlantic Theater Company 30th Anniversary Gala at The Pierre Hotel on March 2, 2015 in New York City. (Photo by Astrid Stawiarz/Getty Images)
Photo: Astrid Stawiarz/Getty Images

With Mad Men beginning its final spate of episodes on April 5, cast members have been reliving their characters’ antics over the past seven seasons. And none of those characters has lived quite as hard as SC&P’s Roger Sterling, played by John Slattery. Case in point: When Vulture asked Slattery where he sees Sterling in ten years, he quipped, “That’s easy, dead!”

Vulture caught up with Slattery at the Atlantic Theater Company’s 30th Anniversary Gala at the Pierre, and he shared one character in particular he wished they’d spent a little more time on — his real-life wife, and onscreen ex-wife, Talia Balsam:

Talia [Balsam] and I shot a scene that never aired, and I wish that they’d unearth that thing. It was a scene in a car [and] we were coming home from a dinner. The first dinner in that first episode with Don and Betty, and Roger and Mona, where they kind of go their separate ways after dinner and then debrief in the car and talk about how ridiculously attractive they were. And it’s a really funny scene between Roger and Mona that, for time or whatever reason, they never shot. And I think it would’ve been a really good introduction into the character of Mona. Man, I wish…we should go back and shoot that.

John Slattery: The MM Scene I Wish They’d Kept