Meet the real life 'Mad Man'

"It was a wonderful asylum. We were wild. We made the antics depicted on every episode of Mad Men look like Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm."

So says Jerry Della Femina, veteran New York adman and self-confessed original Mad Man in his book From those wonderful folks who gave you Pearl Harbor, which inspired the creators of the smash hit TV series Mad Men.

The book - whose title stems from a strapline Della Femina once suggested for Panasonic - was originally published in 1970, but has been re-issued with a new introduction on the back of the success of Mad Men, the award-winning AMC drama depicting the excesses of advertising in the 50s and 60s.

So just how wild was it? "I happen to love excess," says Della Femina over drinks in a Manhattan hotel - appropriately just steps from Madison Avenue - as we discuss the series and what life in advertising in the 60s was really like.

Della Femina has been loosely involved with Mad Men since its beginning. The show’s creator, Matthew Weiner, and its producers had read his book and contacted him to give him a sneak preview of the first episodes.

Della Femina helped promote the show and while he didn't advise directly on content, some of the anecdotes from his book have certainly cropped up in the series – for example, an incident where chickens are let loose in the agency.

Della Femina clearly enjoys Mad Men, and says the character of Don Draper, the complex creative director, is genius.  "I love that Don suffers because he’s screwing around. As long as Don has this sense of guilt about what he’s doing, the show is very smart."

However, he confirms that the goings-on are tame in comparison to the high jinks at his agency, Della Femina Travisano & Partners, where the "sweet smell of burning cannabis" filled the air and everyone "drank, smoked and screwed around".

This is partly, he adds, because the show is really about the 1950s, and so barely touches on what came later. "It was a time when people carried on in secret; later in the 60s they had permission to behave that way."

The Agency Sex Contest

Perhaps the most outrageous behaviour, according to Della Femina, was the Agency Sex Contest, which carried on for years.

Everyone in the agency voted anonymously on paper ballots for the three people they most wanted to sleep with, and prizes included a weekend at the Plaza Hotel for the winning couple. Employees were then encouraged to campaign for themselves with provocative posters displayed around the agency.

On one occasion, a "priggish" client came to visit and all the posters were hurriedly taken down - except for one in the men’s room. The client emerged from a bathroom visit ashen-faced, recounts Della Femina, but did not say a word - and, amazingly, the agency held on to the business.

The competition was never discussed outside the agency, or among its firm of accountants, who were employed to tot up the ballots.

Even the trade press never knew, claims Della Femina. "It was amazing that you could have more than 100 people who could keep this quiet. But people knew that if [the contest] was found out about, it would end."

Although some aspects of agency culture were permissive, the secrecy and prejudice that resonate through Mad Men were also part of agency life in the early 60s. Just as in Mad Men, most gay employees remained in the closet.

Racism and snobbery were also rife. Della Femina, who comes from a working-class Italian background in Brooklyn, was told bluntly in an interview that he would not get a job at J Walter Thompson on the Ford account because "they don’t want your kind working on their business".

So was it really the golden age of advertising? "It was all about people enjoying being in the business," says Della Femina, who is a firm believer that the wild culture made people more productive.

He says, "People would come in early and work late if they knew there was some chance of sexual adventure in the workplace. I still have people contacting me today telling me it was the best job they ever had."

The three-Martini lunch

Of course, the days of the three-Martini lunch are long gone - and, although he still runs his own agency, Della Femina obviously mourns that halcyon era.

He’s no fan of political correctness either, and says the rise of Human Resources marked the "end of fun". He comments, "There was more equality when we were whacked out, stoned and wild than there is now, when there is so much less respect for people."

He’s also critical of the hierarchical corporate culture that prevails today. "We worked directly with the chairman - today, you’d be lucky if it’s the brand manager. We used to be able to ask if the client was having a good year. Now, you are lucky if you are allowed to ask if they are having a good day."

So would he still recommend the industry to talented young creative types? "Absolutely. The wildness was just part of that time. Things are different now, but advertising is a business where you learn something new every day. I cannot think of a better job to have when you are young."

Della Femina sold his agency to WCRS in 1987. But he was not about to get out of the business; instead, he started another agency, Jerry Inc, and now runs Della Femina Rothschild Jeary and Partners. He also owns a restaurant in the Hamptons and a local newspaper in the area, for which he pens an 800-word column every week.

In his book, he writes that "most of the original Mad Men are dead", killed off by the excesses of smoking and drinking and the products they promoted.

But Della Femina is a survivor. He has no plans to retire and is still very much involved in the day-to-day business of advertising.

"It’s all about digital now. I’ve spent the day talking about campaigns on Facebook and Twitter," he says, meanwhile checking his BlackBerry for messages from his daughter, who also plans to enter the ad business.

"The thing is, I spent so long trying to break into this business, after starting as a delivery boy, that it has been like a dream come true. I’m not about to give it up."