text: commissions and fees " commissions and fees " is the twelfth and penultimate episode of the fifth season of the american television drama series mad men and the 64th episode of the series overall . it is co - written by andre jacquemetton and maria jacquemetton , and directed by christopher manley . it aired on the amc channel in the united states on june 3 , 2012 . it is now february , 1967 . don ( jon hamm ) discovers that lane ( jared harris ) stole money from the company and fires him . sally 's ( kiernan shipka ) childhood comes to an end while she has a rendezvous with former neighbor glen bishop ( marten weiner ) . after don expresses a yearning for more , roger ( john slattery ) gets him a meeting with dow chemical , a client that could shape the future of the company . when he returns home , lane falls into a melancholic depression and loses hope for the future . the episode received critical acclaim . the audience for " commissions and fees " rose from the previous episode and was watched by 2 . 41 million viewers . it was also watched by 0 . 8 million viewers in the age 18 - 49 demographic , another gain . the resolution of main character lane pryce 's story received heavy media attention . plot lane has breakfast with a member of the american association of advertising agencies , who praises his fiscal track record and asks him to serve as head of the association 's fiscal control committee . he accepts . examining the company financial records , bert cooper ( robert morse ) finds lane 's forged check and accuses don of giving an unauthorized christmas bonus . don calls lane into his office , shows him the check and serves him a drink . lane pretends to be ignorant at first , but then apologizes while arguing that he was only taking his own money that he had previously invested and for which he had not been compensated . don demands his resignation and gives him the weekend to think of an " elegant exit " , assuring him that this is the worst part of starting over . lane wanders over to joan 's ( christina hendricks ) office with the drink still in his hand , but she sends him away after he makes a lewd comment . at a partners meeting , pete ( vincent kartheiser ) says jaguar would like to pay scdp via a fee structure instead of straight commission . he adds that jaguar 's tire supplier , dunlop , is interested in meeting with scdp . later declaring that he is tired of meager accounts , don tells roger to arrange a meeting with ed baxter at dow chemical company . roger calls dow the " moby - dick " of accounts and reminds him that ken cosgrove ( aaron staton ) is hesitant about doing business with his father - in - law , but don does not care . over drinks , roger tells ken they are going after dow chemical but assures him he is not obligated to work on the account . ken agrees to keep the proceedings secret from his wife if roger agrees to force him onto the account and to exclude pete from all meetings . roger tells don he arranged a meeting with baxter on monday . as betty francis ( january jones ) packs for a family ski vacation , sally complains that she would rather spend the weekend with don and megan ( jessica paré ) . an angry betty calls don to say she is dropping sally off at his apartment . to megan 's surprise , sally shows up at the apartment and informs her that she will be staying for the weekend . megan later complains to don for not telling her about sally 's visit . don confides that he had to fire lane for embezzlement . lane arrives home drunk to find that rebecca has surprised him with a new jaguar . she tells him her reasoning — he never spends on himself . he vomits , but , the next morning , reassures rebecca ( embeth davidtz ) that he likes the car . lane attempts to commit suicide in the middle of the night using the new car 's exhaust , but , in an ironic confirmation of cooper 's earlier retort of jaguars that " they don 't start ! " , the car fails to start . he then walks into scdp 's empty office and types a letter at his desk . sally invites glen to visit while don and megan are at work the next day . he agrees . the next morning , she waits for megan to leave the apartment before rushing to change out of her pajamas . glen arrives at the draper apartment . they visit the american museum of natural history . he admits that he told friends he was going to " do it " with her , but that he thinks of her as a little sister . feeling ill , sally runs to the bathroom and finds blood on her underwear . arriving home , megan looks for sally and sees glen 's duffel bag . sally takes a cab to the francis house and sprints to the bathroom . she later hugs betty tightly and explains that her menstrual cycle has started . glen shows up at the draper apartment and tells megan that sally left him at the museum . betty phones and tells her that sally " became a woman today , " and just needed her mother . megan insists glen stay until she can drive him to his train . betty gives sally a hot water bottle and assures her that starting her cycle means " everything is working . " roger rallies don as they wait outside baxter 's ( ray wise ) office . inside , don puts aside baxter 's concerns about the advertised anti - smoking letter and insists dow chemical needs a new agency , despite having 50 % of the market share . don chides baxter and his staff for allowing dow to be satisfied with a 50 % market share when they should go after more - and scdp is the agency that can help them do it . lane 's secretary drops off some company records with joan , saying lane has not arrived and his office door is locked . joan tries to open lane 's door to find it blocked , and is disturbed by a foul odor and the sight of an upturned end - table . she goes into the neighbouring office , where pete , harry and ken are conversing , and informs them . pete hops up onto a couch to look into lane 's office through the partition window ; he claps his hand over his mouth in shock , and ken holds joan as she bursts into tears . back from their meeting with dow , don and roger arrive to a nearly empty office . they soon discover cooper , pete and joan seated in the break room and are informed by them that lane hanged himself . cooper tells them the other employees do not know yet , and were sent home on a contrived pretext . don , pete , and roger force their way into lane 's office and find his corpse dangling from the door . they cut it down and place it on the couch to preserve his dignity , against the advice from the police about not tampering with a crime scene . roger picks up a note from the floor and opens it . he tells the group that it is lane 's boilerplate resignation . at home , don offers to drive glen back to his dormitory at hotchkiss in connecticut . glen states that " everything you think is going to make you happy just turns to crap . " don asks what glen would do if he could do anything ; later in don 's car , glen drives and smiles as don helps him steer . production jared harris was told after the tenth episode read - through by series creator matt weiner that lane pryce 's time was at an end . about lane 's forced retirement , harris stated : " in the beginning , he doesn 't know that 's the reason he 's being called into the office . once it comes up , he thinks he can bluff his way out of it . and then he goes through all of these emotions , from anger to denial to depression to acceptance . it was all written in there . the [ script ] was very specific about the different turns he would take . " harris continued about his character 's subsequent suicide : " when matt told me [ the jaguar ] idea , i laughed my ass off . when he said the car doesn 't start , i just laughed for about five minutes . nothing goes right for [ lane ] ... the sadness that i feel is that it 's been such an amazing experience . " pete 's ( vincent kartheiser ) , don 's ( jon hamm ) , and roger 's ( john slattery ) " shocked and chaotic " reactions to lane 's corpse were the actors ' genuine reactions , according to harris . series creator matthew weiner called the decision to write off lane pryce " a terrible thing to have to deal with . " he added , " you want to make sure that it 's worth it , that they 're going out with a bang and you 're not sacrificing someone who 's a great actor and a great musician in the orchestra . but also i feel like there have to be stakes . this year was filled with foreboding of violence and death , and the connection of that early summer between the riots , which resulted in death , police killing innocent people , and the richard speck murders and the guy on the texas tower [ charles whitman ] . the randomness and the nihilism that was born from that was something that permeated the story . lane 's story i thought was about someone who has undervalued themselves and that was his only way out , he thought . " reception critical reception the episode received critical acclaim . alan sepinwall of hitfix wrote about the " palpable , painful sense of dread throughout this episode " , stating : " though lane 's tax trouble seemed to come out of nowhere a few weeks ago ... all of his behavior , and don 's , felt very true to form , and not like characters acting in a way designed to create a specific end point . lane was doomed , but by his own actions and foibles as much as by any plot engineering to get that noose around his neck . " the guardian 's paul mcinnes felt the series was " recovering its poise " on its way to the season finale , stating : " after dallying with melodrama ( pete and beth dawes , harry and hari kinsey ) , the show has moved back towards the darker , more sophisticated narratives of cause and unexpected consequence . this week lane may have taken his own life , but don also got his mojo back and the two were directly related . " verne gay of newsday compared the characters of lane pryce and don draper , stating : " both have secret lives protected by carefully constructed façades . for both , the façade is everything — and lane 's would simply fall away , like a line of dominoes when confronted with the consequences of his lie . a lie , after all , made in the service of his son . " ratings " commissions and fees " was watched by 2 . 41 million viewers and received an adult 18 - 49 rating of 0 . 8 . accolades this episode received a nomination for outstanding writing for a drama series for the 64th primetime emmy awards . due to his nomination , jared harris submitted this episode for consideration for primetime emmy award for outstanding supporting actor in a drama series for the 64th primetime emmy awards .