creator, christina hendricks who plays joan har is, january jones, vincent kartheiser who plays pete campbell and jonham who plays don draper himself. also joining us my colleague from cbs this morning, gayle king and as matt says she is almost part of the team because she was as you said an early what. >> i'm not late to the mad men party. >> not at all. >> rose: so. >> the first person i ever knew was watching the show. >> rose: and proudly brought a photograph of her with the cast, to me this morning to show me. but i invited her last evening and i'm pleased that she has joined us here. so what is it, i will ask you, the nonmad men person what is it for you that makes this such compelling television. >> i was born if 1954 and i was living in turkey at the time so i knew nothing, of the 6 '40s. i lived in turkey from first grade to sixth grade. so for me, it's like looking at life the way, what i was missing in the states. hi no grad what life was like and it was just so shocking to see that women were treated the way they were. blacks were treated the way they were. but there was still som

good morning with us is ben, who plays the steaming pete campbell.> and i notice the two of you were holding hands through that segment. it seems like there's a lot of camaraderie between the two of you, at least? >> there's camaraderie between the entire cast. >> the whole lot. >> a lot of ribbing going on. not only practical jokes but, you know, kidney punches and stu stuff like that. >> the two of you in the green room moments ago were literally jumping on top of each other. you were wrestling. >> yes. >> tell me this, you go for almost a year and a half not coming back. was there ever a sense that maybe that was it? that was the final? >> i didn't believe that. >> nor did i. i kind of always knew the powers that be would say -- they would come to their senses and say, this is a show that needs to come back. >> come to their senses thing was, you know, it was -- it was a question of when not if. >> yeah. usually we start airing the show about four weeks after we start filming it. this year they wanted to schedule us at a different time in the seas

. >> reporter: pete campbell, the young and ambitious executive with big plans.m's finances. and not well. so he relies on the agency's secret weapon, sultry, sexy joan, the office manager who actually runs the place. peggy olson has emerged as the show's feminist icon. the female copywriter in a man's world. and there's betty. don draper's unhappy wife. who became his ex-wife, but stayed unhappy. she's at home with three kids. now 17 months later, "mad men" is back. so, will the fans be back, too? i'm glad you thought that was funny, january. we're joined now by jon hamm, john slattery, january jones, matthew weiner, vincent kartheiser and jared harris. where have you been? what was going on here? >> we were hiding. we decided to take some time off and solve some issues, but now we're back. >> how bad were the issues? be honest? how close did this show come to going down the tubes? >> several of us had genter reassignment surgery, so -- >> we were -- >> we were not out of work as long as -- we've not been away from the show as long as the public has. there was a