John Slattery Defends 'Mad Men' Costar January Jones

Is January Jones as cold in real life as Betty Draper, the character she plays on AMC's Mad Men? It depends who you ask. After being dissed by Jared Gilmore, the 11-year-old who until recently played Jones' son on the show, for being "not as approachable as others," 33-year-old Jones has found a champion in another Mad Men costar.

John Slattery, the 49-year-old actor who plays advertising exec Roger Sterling on Mad Men, has come to the actress' defense, telling E! News, "She's a sweetheart."

At the Television Arts & Sciences' Performers Peer Group 2011 Emmys cocktail reception in Los Angeles Tuesday night, Slattery said there's a clear distinction between Jones the actress and Betty Draper the character. "Well, it's an intimidating character. I mean, that's the character," he said. "Betty Draper is an intimidating woman I suppose, if you were a 7-year-old boy (or) her son."

Though Zach Galifianakis famously accused Jones of being rude, Slattery insists January has never displayed any diva-like behavior on set. "We got lucky," he said. "We don't have anybody like that."

In an interview with Vanity Fair in 2008, Slattery similarly raved about Jones. "She's great," Slattery said. "I watched her do a scene once, in the living room, and I couldn't tell whether she didn't know her lines or whether she was -- it wasn't that she didn't know her lines; it was that, not even moment to moment but second to second, you were like, what is actually going to come out of her mouth?

"She really does it the hard way, which is she doesn't figure out, 'Oh this is how I'm going to do it,'" Slattery continued. "She does it the way it happens in the second, in the moment, and it sounds clichéd but it's really something to see. You see it when it's on film, but to see her actually shoot it is wild."

And despite what Jones's TV son had to say about her, Slattery didn't have to think twice when asked what kind of mom the pregnant Jones is going to be, saying, "I have no doubts she'll make a great mother."

Source: http://www.ivillage.com/john-slattery-defends-mad-men-costar-january-jones/1-a-375956

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