'Mad Men' Paid $250K for Beatles Song

Mad Men creator Matthew Weiner paid $250,000 in licensing fees to use the Beatles' "Tomorrow Never Knows" in last Sunday's episode of Mad Men, the New York Times reports. It has become notoriously difficult to license the band's music for television, but Weiner felt the high cost was worthwhile because it was thematically and chronologically consistent with the setting of the show, which takes place in the mid-Sixties.

"It was always my feeling that the show lacked a certain authenticity because we never could have an actual master recording of the Beatles performing," Weiner told the Times, noting that previously attempts to license Beatles music on the show had been declined by Apple Corps. "Not just someone singing their song or a version of their song, but them, doing a song in the show. It always felt to me like a flaw. Because they are the band, probably, of the 20th century."