'Mad Men' Season 7 Spoilers: John Slattery Reveals He Auditioned for Don Draper, Talks Series Finale
"Mad Men" is coming to an end next year, forcing the cast and crew to say goodbye after over 10 years together next season.
The AMC drama, created by Matthew Weiner, first aired in 2007 and stars January Jones, Jon Hamm, Christina Hendricks, and John Slattery, among many more. As the seventh and final season looms in the distance, Slattery recently admitted feeling uncertain about bidding farewell to "Mad Men" while speaking to Variety.
"It's been seven years but by the time it finishes airing it will have been almost 10 years between shooting the pilot, waiting for it to go and then whatever irregular intervals," said the actor who portrays Roger Sterling on the series.
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"I don't know if I'm ready [to say goodbye]," Slattery added. "You don't start out in this business thinking, 'I'm gonna get one great part and play it forever.'"
As the Q&A with Slattery went on, the 51-year-old SAG award-winner revealed that he initially auditioned for the role of Don Draper on "Mad Men." However, the role went to Jon Hamm.
"The beginning of 'Mad Men' was a weird start," Slattery explained to Variety. "I auditioned for the role of Don Draper because my character wasn't evident so much in the pilot, so they kind of pulled one over on me a little bit. But it wasn't long before I got the scripts and went, 'This is better than the last one,' and they kept getting really good. Sometimes the pilot will be great and you start to crank out shows a week at a time and the quality drops because of the time factor. This was kind of the opposite. They just kept getting better and better."
Meanwhile, Slattery is not the only "Mad Men" star to voice a reaction to the upcoming series finale. Hamm discussed the highly-anticipated final season, and although the cast is sworn to secrecy, the actor cryptically referred to the series closer as "tricky."
"It's been a big, big, big part of my life, I've got a lot of really good friends in the cast and crew. It's going to be tricky," the actor told the Huffington Post. "I'm not going to say I wish it wouldn't end, because everything has to end, but it is what it is. We're going to have an emotional journey once we wrap it up. We'll walk away and lock the door."
"Mad Men" returns to AMC in April 2015.
