I'm rewatching Mad Men (love this show) and I forgot about Peggy's brief friendship with the young priest - is there an attraction there? Does he seem too interested in her given his position, or is it just platonic/priestly interest? Would love opinions/ideas.
shareIt's hard to tell. Father Gill told Peggy that he believed that he had been sent to that particular parish to save her soul. He kept trying to get her into confession, but Peggy had had enough religion shoved down her throat by her pious mother and obedient older sister. Many on this board described Father Gill as "creepy."
His most revealing scene was during the Cuban Missile Crises at the end of Season 2:
Peggy: "Anita wanted to come, but she's with the children."
Father Gill: "That's where she should be."
"My mother baked. Thought we'd all appreciate something fresh if we get stuck in here."
"And how are you?"
"I don't know. Nuclear war. We could be gone tomorrow."
"Well, isn't that always the case?"
"That's true."
"You believe in God. I've seen that in you from the moment we met. Sometimes I feel he called me to this parish to reach you."
"No. I didn't know that."
"Well, it's true. Hell is serious and very real, and unless you unburden yourself, you cannot know peace."
"I understand that, Father, but you're upsetting me right now."
"That is your guilt, Peggy. All that God wants is for you to reconcile with him. Don't don't you understand that this could be the end of the world and you could go to hell?"
"I can't believe that's the way God is. Good night, Father."
I think he was somewhere between being genuinely priestly and being attracted to Peggy, I don't think Peggy was attracted to him, at all.
Above and beyond the fact that he was a Catholic priest, and verboten to her, while probably well-meaning, all he did was try to push her, and she was already rejecting her Catholic upbringing. The only reason she went to church is because her mother, and secondarily sister, guilted her into it. Peggy, herself, didn't want to go and had no interest in it, or him.
Something about that storyline stuck out as a disjointed storyline. My guess is that when we first meet Peggy, she went to a secretarial school and is obediently listening to Joan and puts her hand on Don's as if that's expected--all things suggesting she's a good girl who follows the rules set by authority figures. This may have been the first example of Peggy standing up against one of those figures even if facing scolding or guilting.
I think he had interest in her with some romantic feelings but he also wanted to save her and I will agree with the creepy vibe someone else mentioned. Didn't he also want her to do that dance advertisement poster for free? Anyone who's ever been in graphic design or anything like that (or even doctors or lawyers and other professions) has probably had "oh can you do what you're usually paid to do for me but for free?" Yeah the church maybe doesn't have a big budget, but I think it was another sign he didn't really respect her or her profession and looked down on her a bit. Her saying "I don't think a loving God would do that" seemed also like a "He's not going to punish me for choosing what's best for me and the baby I had and He's not a God that would limit my talent and my creative abilities for any reason."
This is all off the top of my head right now, so feel free to disagree.
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Consider the daffodil. And while you're doing that I'll be over here looking through your stuff.
After enlisting her to help with the dance advertisement poster (and helping himself to the firm's copying machine), he put her in an awkward position with the old ladies on the dance committee, who thought her "A Night to Remember" theme too risque.
She thought it was job to defend her work, while he put her in the middle with the committee. I don't remember how it turned out, but she was upset to have been put in that position.
Yeah she obviously didn't enjoy that, although part of the ad job is to convince the client you're right and know what's best without being insulting, but since she did work for free as a favor then was getting attacked for it, no one is going to enjoy being in that position. I think part of the issue was he didn't defend her or openly agree with her. So there was something going on where he didn't really respect her but thought it was his place to make her confess her since, which I guess is a priest's job, but it was hard for her to respect someone who never respected her.
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Consider the daffodil. And while you're doing that I'll be over here looking through your stuff.
Add me to the list of those who think of him as creepy. Colin Hanks did the role very well. The creepiness isn't over-the-top, but many of us sense it. (Didn't he audition for Pete Campbell initially?) Creepy in what way, I can't firmly say. I can't quite put my finger on his intentions. Maybe it's my lack of knowledge with the way it was back then before Vatican II--my parents are Bobby Draper's age--but if any parish priest kept needling me in such a way, I'd not have been as polite as Peggy. (Of course, I'm already a cynical, "liberal" Gen Y-er who grapples with religion anyhow. I'm only mentioning it at all to offer perspective of how unsettling Father Gill's behavior was to me, as a Catholic.)
Father Gill kept inappropriately pushing and pushing at Peggy, and I have always wondered if it was a guise. I have thought that if Peggy was receptive to him, and if he felt he "saved" her, the relationship would have progressed to something romantic... at least in Father Gill's hopes. (Certainly not where Peggy was going.) it almost seemed like manipulation to fix the "lost girl" and then go from there.
I think perhaps Father Gill didn't acknowledge it himself, but he seemed pulled toward her in more than a zealous way. Maybe I read too much into the looks he gave her and him pleading to her expertise when asking her tor help for his Palm Sunday sermon (in his car, no less) and then free help for that dance. He got far too personal with her in matters beyond Catechism, and even trying to push her to "open up to him" was creepy to me.