On Friday night, Vanity Fairand Maybelline co-hosted an Emmy celebration for Mad Men, the AMC drama that will be entering this Sunday’s awards show with a robust 12 nominations. Fortunately for everyone involved, the pool-side soirée at the Chateau Marmont bore little resemblance to the pool-side Hollywood romp attended by Don, Roger, and Harry last season on Mad Men’s “A Tale of Two Cities” episode, as there were no hashish-induced hallucinations or situations that demanded Roger Sterling’s emergency resuscitation, by our tally.

There was, however, a perfectly respectable amount of drinking and gentlemanly smoking done by guests, who mingled with co-stars Jon Hamm (wearing a suit and full, playoff-style Emmy beard), January Jones, Jessica Paré, Elisabeth Moss, Rich Sommer, Kevin Rahm, and Linda Cardellini, as well as Mad Men mastermind Matthew Weiner. As cigarette girls wound through the Chateau’s breezy backyard with trays of bedazzled Maybelline mascara tubes, we picked the brains of the Mad Men cast, asking about their rumored post-Emmys ritual and what they thought of AMC’s announcement that the show’s final season would be split into two.

Contrary to one report on Friday, Weiner told us that he was not bothered by the network’s plans, which he was informed of before he began writing the show’s final season(s) five weeks ago. “This was their decision and I thought, ‘All right, I can’t argue with you if this [strategy] is what worked for Breaking Bad,’” Weiner told us. “It’s not the way I’ve done it before, but 78 or 80 episodes into it, I welcome the challenge.” Explaining that he and the crew will still film the final season at once, freeing cast members to move on to other projects, he said, “It’s kind of the best of both worlds because we’ll get to be finished with the show but get to enjoy the show being on the air. I would hope that [viewers] would trust me to know that just because [each mini-season will be] seven episodes does not mean that it will not be worth watching.”

Similarly unfazed by the news was January Jones, who said that she had “just heard about” AMC’s decision but was fine with it. “I mean, any opportunity to drag [the series] out as long as possible,” the actress said, would be a good thing, especially since her character, Betty, got her groove back last season. With a dramatic weight loss, surge in confidence, and bolstered relationship with her daughter Sally, Jones said she was very satisfied with her character’s arc this past go-round. “I loved the whole season,” she told us. “I loved that Betty got her strength and her beauty again. Any scenes with Jon and Kiernan [Shipka, who plays Sally], I always enjoy.”

Nearby, Jessica Paré, who plays Don Draper’s current beleaguered wife, Megan, told us that she is staying optimistic about Megan and Don’s future. Even though Don reneged on his promise to move to California with Megan so that she could officially start her career, Paré said, “if it were up to me, she would get everything she wanted, and the two of them would be happy together forever.” Joking, she added, “And that’s why I’m not a writer.”

After fully embracing her character at the end of Season Five (even though she admits Megan “can be capricious and, I guess, high maintenance”), Paré said that she did feel a twinge of jealousy last season while watching Don have an affair with their neighbor, Sylvia. “But it’s purely because I have such a kinship with Megan,” she explained. “I want Megan to be O.K., to be happy. So when I see Don doing something that would hurt Megan, I feel upset for her.” (Despite those feelings, Paré and Linda Cardellini, who plays Sylvia, seemed delightfully and genuinely close at the party last night.)