As fans analyze Sunday night's emotionally satisfying (if overly tidy) ending to Mad Men, the Weekly is glad to finally have an answer to the question:
As we reported then:
The Weekly discovered the iconic heart throb behind Draper's character, Jon Hamm, has been in the area with the cast and crew, filming the hit show Mad Men down near Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park in Big Sur.
The footage will be play into the much-anticipated last half of its final season, airing in Spring 2015…
The California Film Commission confirmed the Mad Men shoot in Big Sur. A production company—under a pseudonym—filed for a permit to use six turnouts off Highway 1 for trailers, etc., from June 23-26.
Now we know they filmed that closing scene at the private Anderson Canyon estate just north of Big Sur's renowned Esalen Institute. (Esalen administrators reportedly turned away Mad Men's request to actually film there. Stephanie only refers to it as a "retreat center" up the coast from L.A.)
For more on Esalen—and its psychedelic hookups, political coups and alien spirits—check out our long, detailed history of the institute on its 50th anniversary.
As Don (nee Dick) intones the series' closing "Om" on the South Coast cliff, wearing all white, his lifetime of sins confessed and forgiven, his anguish purged, the viewer gets the feeling the fraudulent facade that has masked his character through seven seasons has finally crumbled away.
And that smile comes across his face. Is it enlightenment?
No. It's a commercial.
Pure genius.