Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

barkbarkkrabkrab t1_ix8c27m wrote

The Patient felt like an actual Jewish story because there is actual cultural tension between Orthodox and Reform/Conservative jews and it added meaning to the main story. Transparent is probably the most Reform Jewish show ever. Admittedly Mrs.Maisel doesn't hit right for me- sure she talks a lot about making briskets, but her complete obliviousness to civil rights or like hiring/housing discrimination in the 1960s drives me nuts!

5

Bears_On_Stilts t1_ix8olih wrote

Midge Maisel, besides her involvement in the very Jewish comedy circuit, is embodying the mostly-forgotten archetype of "the Jewish Princess." Upper middle class to upper class, materialistic and pop-culture savvy, not especially interested in ethnic or religious tradition or history beyond a superficial level, somewhat apolitical, thoroughly Americanized and "white" despite her parents being much more entrenched in a lived traditional Jewish experience.

Remember that it's been over a century since the Jewish diaspora hit America in its biggest wave, and nearly a hundred years since the Holocaust. Jewish culture in America has become extremely secularized and mainstreamed, so the notion of "Jewish girl behaving like a white girl" doesn't really hold water anymore as a character archetype. But you get a lot of Jewish Princess jokes in the earlier works of Mel Brooks, Allan Sherman, Neil Simon (whose distinctive style is aped STRONGLY by Mrs. Maisel), etc.

7

BlackSpinedPlinketto t1_ix97vkf wrote

Oh lol like literally the princess in Spaceballs? I guess that was what he was doing. I loved that movie, even though I had never met or heard of many Jews. And I hadn’t seen Star Wars.

1