‘The View’: John Slattery Calls ‘Mad Men’ HBO Max Snafu ‘Not a Great Look’

Amanda Bell December 5, 2025, 12:04 pm

John Slattery is speaking up about HBO Max’s big Mad Men gaffe. The actor appeared on The View‘s Friday (December 5) episode (which was taped on Thursday) to talk about his new buzzy historic thriller Nuremberg, and he was asked by cohost Alyssa Farah Griffin about the viral mistake the streamer made in bringing the decorated AMC drama to its platform.

Mad Men was added to HBO Max’s library on December 1 with the first 4K rendition of the series, and fans quickly noticed a major mistake in transmission: In Season 1 Episode 7, “Red in the Face,” Slattery’s character Roger Sterling is shown vomiting after being given too many oysters and vodka drinks at lunch by Don Draper (Jon Hamm), and behind him in the scene, the visual effects team operating the effects machine to make the moment happen could be seen. The error was possibly a consequence of converting the series to 4K and omitting post-production scrubbing of the crew from the background.

Griffin brought up the matter by saying, “I loved you in Mad Men, so I have to ask about it, your Emmy-nominated role. I should say it’s been 10 years since it’s been off air, but it’s been remastered, and it’s now on HBO Max, and it had a bit of a viral moment. I’m rewatching it, actually, as we speak. It shows an infamous scene where your character is vomiting. But in post-production, they forgot to take out some of the camera people and what looks like a vomit machine. I never knew that existed on set.”

“A machine?” Sunny Hostin asked.

'Mad Men' Fans Notice Big Mistake With HBO Max's 4K Version

About that moment, Slattery joked, “I thought it was me throwing up!”

He then explained the sight, saying, “Those gentlemen, there were a couple of them in the picture. They were an outside FX company that specializes in, not so much vomit, but stuff like that.”

“So what are we seeing here? What do they do, they put a hose?” Ana Navarro then asked, pointing to a still of the scene.

“They put a hose on the upstage side of my body, away from camera, and then I guess it goes behind my ear, taped onto my head. Then they go, ‘Three, two, one,’ and you do the thing,” he said.

“It’s just ruined every vomit scene,” Joy Behar joked.

Slattery continued, “Well, they did this because they rendered it in 4K. And someone didn’t check the fix before they put it on, and it went on air like that.”

“It’s nice the guy’s supporting the other guy,” Sara Haines noted of the crew members in the shot.

“Yeah, not a great look,” Slattery said of the streamer’s mistake.