Miss Ida Blankenship is one of Mad Men’s most brilliant and underappreciated comic creations—a walking reminder that the show’s genius wasn’t just in its brooding existentialism and smoky glamour, but in its ability to toss a grenade of absurdity into the center of an otherwise poised and polished office.
Played with sublime dryness by Randee Heller, Miss Blankenship enters the series in Season 4 as Don Draper’s secretary—a deliberate antidote to his usual string of flirtatious, hypercompetent young women. She is old, cantankerous, nearly blind, and gloriously indifferent to Don’s aura of cool. When she tells Joan, “He needed a mother,” it’s a devastating one-liner that doubles as surgical analysis of Don’s inner void.
Her brilliance lies in how she breaks the show's tonal expectations. In a world where everyone is tightly wound, calculating, or drowning quietly, Miss Blankenship is blunt, bizarre, and immune to pretense. Her offscreen backstory is delightfully scandalous (“She was born in a barn, and died on the 37th floor of a skyscraper. She was an astronaut.”), and her sudden death at her desk becomes one of the show's darkest and funniest moments. The characters scramble to discreetly wheel her corpse out of the office as if it’s just another PR disaster to contain—perfectly lampooning corporate denial and repression.
In just a few episodes, Miss Blankenship became a cult favorite. She’s a sly commentary on ageism, gender roles, and the disposable nature of office life, all while delivering deadpan zingers worthy of Dorothy Parker with a sinus infection. She is proof that even in the meticulously designed world of Mad Men, a single offbeat supporting character can steal the spotlight—and remind us not to take the whole smoke-and-mirrors charade too seriously.
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Write a treatment for a Miss Blankenship spin off series. (Simply assume her death had not happened.)
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Title: Miss Blankenship: Confidential
Format: Half-hour dramedy series
Tone: A blend of Veep, Better Call Saul, and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel—snappy, deadpan, biting, and oddly moving
Setting: Manhattan, late 1960s
Logline:
Before she was Don Draper’s secretary, Miss Ida Blankenship lived a hundred lives—and she’s not done yet. In a world of men with secrets, Ida’s got sharper instincts, dirtier gossip, and an uncancellable pension. Now, from her desk at Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, she starts doling out advice, solving problems, and meddling with Manhattan’s elite—all while hiding a few scandals of her own.
Series Treatment
Premise:
Miss Blankenship may look like a relic of another era, but underestimate her at your peril. Beneath the orthopedic shoes and cataracts lies a razor-sharp mind, a memory like a steel trap, and a Rolodex that includes bootleggers, ex-lovers, and at least one sitting senator.
After being reassigned to Don Draper as a joke (thanks, Joan), Ida takes the demotion in stride—until she realizes the modern world is catching up with her. She starts a side hustle: confidential consulting for secretaries, mistresses, and overlooked women across Manhattan. Want to keep your boss from tanking a deal? Ida knows how. Got a boyfriend in the Village who might be FBI? Ida has a contact. Need a lawyer who doesn't ask questions? Ida's got a guy. She's the office's unlicensed therapist, fixer, and Oracle of Third Avenue.
Each week, Ida fields a new crisis from the women around her—secretaries, switchboard operators, wives, even Peggy and Joan. Some problems are petty. Some are profound. Some are potentially felonious. All are handled from behind her typewriter with exactly one raised eyebrow and a scalding cup of Sanka.
Structure:
Each episode follows two tracks:
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The Case of the Week – a problem, rumor, or workplace disaster that Ida “investigates” or subtly fixes using gossip, blackmail, or good old-fashioned common sense.
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Ida’s Past Unfolds – flashbacks to her earlier years, revealing a younger Ida navigating Prohibition speakeasies, 1930s burlesque clubs, and the wartime stenographer corps. Think Forrest Gump meets His Girl Friday, with cigarettes and judgment.
Supporting Cast:
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Myrna DeVries – A nervy, newly hired secretary who becomes Ida’s reluctant protégée.
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Mr. Appleton – An HR manager obsessed with procedures; Ida’s arch-nemesis.
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Maurice “Mo” Klein – A retired private investigator and Ida’s off-again flame who still does a little “freelance” work.
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Shirley, Dawn, and the typing pool – A rotating Greek chorus providing commentary and moral support (or gossip and sabotage).
Sample Episode Titles:
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“The Ink Is Still Wet” – Ida discovers a junior copywriter plagiarized an ad from a Canadian billboard campaign.
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“Some Men Need Ruining” – An ambitious secretary wants revenge on a philandering VP; Ida helps—grudgingly.
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“Girdles and Wiretaps” – Ida uncovers an illegal FBI sting operation… by mistake.
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“A Lady Always Leaves a Trail” – A younger Ida in 1942 finds herself as a codebreaker in D.C.—and caught in a love triangle with two naval officers.
Season Arc:
As the season unfolds, it becomes clear Ida’s consulting is more than just office hijinks—it’s her way of reclaiming power in a system that never made space for women like her. But the past is catching up with her. An old scandal resurfaces (was she really married to a mobster? Did she once steal government documents?), and Ida must use all her wits—and Rolodex entries—to stay ahead of the consequences.
Why Now:
In an era obsessed with revisiting prestige dramas, Miss Blankenship: Confidential offers something rare: a feminist spin-off that’s equal parts satire and heart, celebrating the wisdom, wit, and rage of older women who know exactly how the sausage gets made.
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SCRIPT FOR TEASER PROMO
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Teaser Trailer Script – Miss Blankenship: Confidential
(Running Time: 60 seconds | Tone: Dry, fast, slightly unhinged)
[FADE IN]
Black screen. A typewriter clacks. The sound is sharp, rhythmic, relentless.
VOICEOVER (wry, female, mid-60s):
“Some people make history. I proofread it.”
[SMASH CUT TO:]
The Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce office. Chaos. A man screaming about losing the Kodak account. A secretary in tears. Don Draper pacing, tie undone.
DON (snapping):
"Where the hell is that memo?"
[CUT TO:]
Ida Blankenship (late 60s, eyes like razors behind bifocals), calmly typing.
MISS BLANKENSHIP:
"In the Outbox. Where your dignity used to be."
She drops a paperclip into her coffee.
[TITLE CARD]
This Fall… Meet the woman who’s seen it all… and kept receipts.
[MONTAGE QUICK CUTS:]
– Ida eavesdropping through the switchboard.
– Flashback: Young Ida winking at a mobster in 1940.
– Ida handing a manila envelope labeled “CONFIDENTIAL” to a terrified junior exec.
– An office party where she spike-pours her own coffee from a silver flask.
– Ida staring down a trembling HR manager.
– Myrna (her nervous new assistant):
“You just blackmailed the head of finance!”
– Ida, shrugging:
“Well, it’s Tuesday.”
[VOICEOVER]:
“She’s not your secretary. She’s your reckoning.”
[FINAL SCENE:]
JOAN (leaning in):
"Ida, what's your secret?"
MISS BLANKENSHIP (without looking up):
"I don’t trust anyone who wears aftershave and says he’s a feminist."
[TITLE CARD:]
Miss Blankenship: Confidential
Coming Soon. Get in line, boys.
[TYPEWRITER DING. SMASH TO BLACK.]
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Howard Stern Show Recap:
“The Ida Blankenship Interview”
Aired: April 16, 2025 | SiriusXM Channel 100
Summary:
In an instant cult classic episode, Howard Stern devoted nearly the entire show to a longform, no-holds-barred interview with Mad Men legend Miss Ida Blankenship—resurrected, apparently, by popular demand and sheer force of personality. What followed was 90 minutes of acerbic wisdom, profanity-laced recollections, and more than one bombshell about Madison Avenue in the 1960s.
Highlights:
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On working for Don Draper:
“He thought he was James Bond. I thought he was an alcoholic with a jawline. I kept a flask in my desk just to stay even with him.” -
On her pre-advertising days:
Miss Blankenship revealed she once ran a phone-answering service for mob lawyers, briefly dated both a jazz drummer and a bishop, and was accidentally at the Bay of Pigs for “the catering.” -
Call-ins:
Several listeners phoned in with “Blankenship Sightings” from the late '60s, including:-
A woman who claimed Ida punched her father in the face at a Nixon rally (“He deserved it. He was wearing a cravat.”)
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A retired ad man who swore Ida once got a toothpaste account by threatening to leak an executive’s "off-label Polaroids."
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Robin Quivers:
Couldn’t stop laughing, especially when Ida declared: “I told Peggy Olson she’d be running the place someday. Of course, I also told the same thing to the elevator operator. Women need hope.” -
Wack Pack Moment:
Beetlejuice called in to ask if she was “the old lady who stole his sandwich at Penn Station in 1999.” Ida paused and replied: “Was it ham? Then yes.”
Final Segment:
Howard tried to play “F, Marry, Kill” with Ida involving Don, Roger, and Bert Cooper. Her answer:
“Kill Don. Marry Roger—at least he’d buy dinner. And I already did Bert, thank you very much. 1947. Elevator broke down. We made do.”
Rating: 9.5/10
A riotous, weirdly touching episode that confirmed Ida Blankenship is both national treasure and national security risk. A follow-up appearance is rumored—assuming she doesn’t flee the country again for “diplomatic reasons.”
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Do we infer that MISS Blankenship, Never married?
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Ah, but that’s the beauty of Miss Blankenship—like so much in Mad Men, the title is a red herring, and the backstory is a cocktail of truth, myth, and plausible deniability.
Traditionally, “Miss” would suggest she never married. But Ida Blankenship’s vibe—world-weary, seen-it-all, unbothered by propriety—complicates that. She feels like someone who’s been married once (or thrice), possibly under assumed names, perhaps annulled, maybe even in international waters.
In Season 4, Bert Cooper memorably says:
“She was born in 1898 in a barn. She died on the 37th floor of a skyscraper. She was an astronaut.”
This line, while absurd, implies a long, bizarre life. Fans have speculated that Ida may have:
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Had a wartime romance that ended in tragedy (or prison).
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Married a traveling vacuum cleaner salesman “for tax reasons.”
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Used “Miss” as a professional affectation, a barrier between her past lives and her current clerical dominion.
So, do we infer she never married? Only if we ignore the wink behind the glasses. “Miss” Blankenship might never have settled, but she sure as hell lived.
