Show notes
There are a lot of things to love about the new Netflix show “Nobody Wants This.” Unfortunately, its depiction of Jewish women isn’t one of them.
When news first broke that a rom-com show was in the works starring Adam Brody as a hot L.A. rabbi who falls for an agnostic, blonde sex/relationships podcaster played by Kristen Bell, we were ecstatic. We are rom-com devotees who have crushed on Seth Cohen and idolized Veronica Mars. We’re podcasters. And we are, respectively, a Jewish woman and a non-Jewish woman who is married to a Jew. If a TV show was crafted in a lab to appeal to our particular set of passions and lived experiences, it would be “Nobody Wants This.” And yet, after cruising through 10 eminently binge-able episodes, we were left simultaneously delighted by Brody and Bell’s crackling chemistry, and uneasy about the show’s rather vicious portrayal of Jewish women.
It’s clear that Erin Foster, who created “Nobody Wants This” based on her own love story with now-husband Simon Tikhman — he’s not a rabbi, but he is Jewish and Foster converted as a result — has a deep connection to and respect for Judaism. Some of the loveliest moments of the show are when Noah and Joanne connect over the meaning that Jewish traditions and culture can bring, like observing Shabbat or “wrestling with what God is or isn’t.” But much less care was put into crafting the Jewish women who surround Noah: his extractive mother Bina (Tovah Feldshuh), his mean sister-in-law Esther (Jackie Tohn), his manipulative ex-girlfriend Rebecca (Emily Arnook), and the gaggle of more peripheral friends (the WAGs) who only seem to talk about Aruba, breastfeeding and their ugly line of chokers.
The central question at the heart of “Nobody Wants This” is whether it is possible for a gentile who has never even heard the word “shalom” (unlikely for a native Angeleno, but I digress) to seriously be with a rabbi who is “all in” on his faith. It’s fertile ground upon which to set romantic obstacles, and it’s easy to root for Bell’s Joanne and Brody’s Noah to bridge their cultural gaps and make out. But the main obstacles we see during season 1 of “Nobody Wants This” come in the form of Jewish women, who are frothing at the mouth to defeat their ostensible mortal enemy: the “shiksa.”
There’s a long history of the “shiksa goddess” — the blonde, gentile woman that acts as irresistible lust object for Jewish men — in American pop culture; first uttered in the 1927 talkie “The Jazz Singer,” chased after in 1972’s “The Heartbreak Kid,” and crooned about in 2014’s movie-musical adaptation of “The Last Five Years.” The shiksas of “Nobody Wants This” — Bell’s Joanne and her sister Morgan (Justine Lupe) — represent freedom for the men they encounter. They are open and vibrant and funny and successful and flawed in ways that are compelling. They’re so beautiful that their mere presence can stun Jewish men into slack-jawed silence. (Yes, this actually happens. Twice.) It’s easy to see why Noah and his brother Sasha (Timothy Simons) would be drawn to Joanne and Morgan, especially because the women in their own community all seem to be cruel, controlling, irrational, manipulative, overbearing shrews. (A notable exception is the welcoming Rabbi Shira played by Leslie Grossman.)
Bina, Esther, Rebecca and the WAGs are more caricatures than human beings, and in totality perpetuate some of the most noxious stereotypes that exist about Jewish women. In a paper from the Jewish Women’s Archive, scholar Riv-Ellen Prell charts the evolution of the Jewish American Princess and Jewish Mother archetypes, both of which developed out of in-community anxieties which were subsequently filtered through a gendered lens, and which then proliferated in the wider culture.
Of the Jewish Mother, Prell writes:
“Rather than offered out of concern and responsibility, her caretaking served her own needs. She induced guilt. She gave in order to obligate. She loved because she wanted. She suffered in order to be compensated. Rather than sustaining, she destroyed.”
In the same paper, Prell describes the JAP:
“The JAP was portrayed as excessive in wants and desires… The JAP not only wanted, she withheld and denied, rendering her Jewish partner a slave. The culture’s attack on Jewish masculinity, the generalized middle class anxiety about the accessibility of their class to their children, and a consumer culture that narrowed its definitions of attractiveness and desirability conspired to create the JAP. She was so hateful that separating from her—even destroying her—promised liberation by self-erasure.”
Bina is the consummate Jewish Mother. She controls her passive husband, emasculates her sons, and whispers “you’ll never end up with my son” like a threat into Joanne’s ear. Even her dedication to keeping kosher is framed as a tool for familial manipulation rather than a genuine practice. (Joanne witnesses Bina housing prosciutto in the kitchen after excoriating her for bringing pork into the house.) The JAP haunts nearly every other Jewish woman character. Rebecca’s relationship ends because of her “excessive” desires. Esther effectively neuters Sasha. When Joanne is trying to win Esther and her crew of WAGs over, Morgan describes them as “angry women who haven’t had fun in over a decade.”
The Jewish women of “Nobody Wants This” exist only in opposition to Joanne and Morgan, and their paper-thin rendering takes a show that contains so much deliciousness, and turns it all a bit sour. As Esther Zuckerman put it: “You can see why Joanne would want to be married to a Jewish man; you can see why she’s not sure about wanting to become a Jewish woman.”
Journalist Elizabeth Karpen recently asked Foster directly about the genesis of her show’s Jewish women characters on “Nobody Wants This.” Her answer was as illuminating as it is disappointing: “It wasn’t really something I was thinking about too much,” she said.
Unfortunately, it shows. Here’s hoping that the show can course correct for season 2, because everybody wants more Rabbi Noah.
In this week’s subscriber podcast, we get into the joys and failures of “Nobody Wants This,” our eternal crushes on Adam Brody, the show’s shared cultural DNA with “Keeping The Faith,” and more. Hope you enjoy! Xo
Related Reading:
“Nobody Wants This’ Review: Kristen Bell and Adam Brody Share Crackling Chemistry in Netflix’s Frustratingly Uneven Rom-Com,” Daniel Fienberg, The Hollywood Reporter
“Nobody Wants This Mean-Spirited Depiction of Jewish Women in Nobody Wants This,”Esther Zuckerman, TIME
“Jewish Gender Stereotypes in the United States,” Riv-Ellen Prell, Jewish Women’s Archive
“Netflix’s ‘Nobody Wants This’ Brings Up the Age-Old Question: Is the Word ‘Shiksa’ Offensive?,” Lior Zaltzman, Kveller
“‘Nobody Wants This’ Creator Erin Foster Wasn’t Thinking ‘Too Much’ About the Show’s Depiction of Jewish Women,” Elizabeth Karpen, Hey Alma
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