Pete discusses life insurance with Howard, his commuter friend, who reveals that he has a new, attractive mistress and an apartment in the city. In the train station parking lot that evening, Pete meets Howard's wife, Beth, who has locked her keys in her car. Pete drives her home, during which time she discusses the dire state of her marriage. He comforts her, which leads to them to have sex on the floor of her home. After the incident, Beth tells Pete to forget what happened, which he can't. He calls her from work and even orchestrates a situation whereby Howard invites him to dinner. Before creating an excuse to leave, Pete tells Beth to meet him at the Hotel Pennsylvania. Later, he checks in — and when she doesn't arrive, he smashes a champagne glass against the wall.
Megan wants to get back into acting and begins to resent her job in advertising. She lies to Peggy about leaving work early, saying she's going to meet up with Don when she's actually going to an audition, only for Peggy to work out that she was lying when Don calls the office to ask where Megan is. After getting Megan to confess what's going the next morning, Peggy scolds her taking a high-value job in the agency that others would "kill to have". Later that night, Megan wakes Don up to tell him of her desire to start acting again, and with Don's apparent blessing, she quits her job at the agency the next morning. Don sees her off to the elevator as she leaves the office. Moments after she leaves, Don calls up another elevator, having one last thing to say to her. But the elevator doors open with no elevator, just a bare elevator shaft. He peers down into the empty abyss and then steps backward.
With Megan having left, Peggy has to stand in for her in an improvised husband-and-wife act for the benefit of a new client, Cool Whip. Unlike the version Don and Megan demonstrated early in the episode, the Don and Peggy version has no chemistry whatsoever and is further undermined by an unrehearsed Peggy fluffing the tag-line. Don scolds Peggy, but she turns this on Don, making her frustrations clear and calling him out for misdirecting his anger onto her when he's actually angry with Megan for quitting the agency.
Don complains to Megan about not knowing what is going on in youth and popular culture, leading Megan to buy him a copy of The Beatles' Revolver LP. She tells him to start with the last track, "Tomorrow Never Knows". As Megan leaves for her acting class, Don plays the song and sits with a glass of whisky. Across a montage setting the various characters on their way, he listens to most of the song, but then picks up the needle, turns the record off, and walks back to his bedroom in silence, having failed to discern what's going on in youth and popular culture. The song immediately resumes during the end credits.
Tropes Appearing In Lady Lazarus
- The Dog Bites Back: Peggy angrily calls out Don for misdirecting his anger over Megan quitting the agency at her, especially when she has mentored Megan:Peggy : I did everything right, and I am still getting it from you! You know what? You are not mad at me, so shut up!
- Diegetic Switch: The episode ends with Don, who's just been given a copy of the Revolver LP by Megan, playing "Tomorrow Never Knows" by The Beatles on his record player. After he turns it off, this becomes the closing credits music. The rights to use the song cost the producers $250,000, around five times as much as the typical cost of licensing a song for TV — and contrasts with the closing credits music for "Hands and Knees", when an instrumental version of "Do You Want to Know a Secret" was used.
- Good Adultery, Bad Adultery: Beth is treated sympathetically, with her feeling guilty immediately after sleeping with Pete and rejecting his offer to meet in a hotel. Howard, on the other hand, is depicted as a sleaze bag for proudly bragging about his affair and dismissing his wife's feelings.
- Foreshadowing: Pete tells Howard that his company life insurance policy has a suicide clause.
- Literary Allusion Title: The episode title refers to the poem by Sylvia Plath. Which, given that she committed suicide also counts as an example of Foreshadowing.
- Misdirected Outburst: Don lashes out at Peggy after the Cool Whip pitch, which stems from Megan quitting advertising. Peggy explicitly calls him out on this.
- No Smoking: Just when Don really needs a cigarette after being torn a new one by Peggy, he's told that he can't, as they're in a laboratory.
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Romance on the Set: Beth, Campbell's affair partner, is played by Alexis Bledel. She and Vincent Kartheiser dated after meeting on the show and were wed from 2014 to 2022. - Rule of Symbolism: After Megan leaves the office on her last day, Don calls up another elevator. However, the doors open to just a bare elevator shaft, reflecting his emotional state.
- Ship Tease: Don and Peggy (a popular fan
ship) act out a husband-and-wife skit for a client. It goes badly. This series will later do this with Don and Joan. - Shout-Out: Pete's reading The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon during his daily commute. Don, meanwhile, listens to (part of) "Tomorrow Never Knows" by The Beatles on the Revolver LP.
- Sympathetic Adulterer: Howard's wife, Beth, sleeps with Pete after she deduces that Howard's cheating on her.
