Don Draper Makes the Ladies Swoon at Michael's

Jon Hamm had whiskey breath. On the evening of Wednesday, Sept. 3, Mr. Hamm—the actor who plays Don Draper, the dashing and deceiving creative director in a 1960s Madison Avenue ad house on AMC's Mad Men—was swirling his drink (whiskey with ice, in ... a wine glass) in the window-walled back room of Michael's on 55th Street. Best Life magazine threw him a party celebrating his first time as a cover boy in their September issue.

The Daily Transom was half expecting him to pull out a cigarettte and light up. Instead, he was behaving and checking out the artwork.

"That's a nice painting right there," he said, stopping mid-sentence with a guest to observe a painting of a man looking out on a landscape with his head turned. After his firm handshake and smile that makes the knees melt, we wanted to get inside Mr. Hamm's head—with its big, Hollywood forehead, chiseled chin, slicked-back sculpture of black hair—and part that cloud of mystery that hovers over his Mad Men character.

Since his character on the show seems defined by his accoutrements—gorgeous wife, suburban home, liquor cabinet in the office—we wondered what Mr. Hamm thinks defines a man today. "A man is defined by who we're with and what we think and what we do, and not the things we own," said Mr. Hamm, though he added: "There's still those signposts today. But that's the ironic message we have on the show."

White-suited waiters were circulating trays of lots of "seared" meats (tuna, beef) and crab cakes around the room, stuffed with Best Life employees and publicists. During one of the final episodes of last season's Mad Men, Mr. Draper's boss, Bert Cooper, said "a man is the room he is standing in—and right now, Donald Draper is in this room." He certainly was. There was a slight hush and a few swoony sighs from the ladies (and some men!), in their little black dresses and sky high heels, when Mr. Hamm, who was wearing a dark gray suit and pin-striped tie, brushed by them.

Alas, his girlfriend, actress Jennifer Westfeldt, was on his arm, sipping a glass of Champagne and looking stunning in a sequined black top and a high-waisted, cream-colored pencil skirt. They've been together for a decade, when Ms. Westfeldt got him out of a job as a set dresser for a soft-core porn and cast him for an unpaid part in her 1997 Off Off Broadway play Lipschtick, which eventually turned into the 2001 independent rom com Kissing Jessica Stein.

They'll return to the theater district and see South Pacific while they're in town (after a stop at the U.S. Open, of course). Mr. Hamm is busy with film these days, including a starring role in the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still with Keanu Reeves, which will be released his winter. But, Ms. Westfeldt might be returning to Broadway, Mr. Hamm told the Daily Transom. "I don't want to reveal too much, nothing is settled yet." So we'll keep it secret for you? "Yes," he chuckled. "Just us."