(Jewish Group) Mazel tov, Mrs. Maisel

[Behind the Aegis]

(THIS IS THE JEWISH GROUP! RESPECT!!)

On Sunday, the Golden Globes for best TV comedy series and best actress in a comedy or musical went to The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Amazon’s new show about a young mother who becomes a stand-up comedian after her husband walks out on her.


Maisel is a pun on mazel, the Hebrew word for luck, which when joined to tov (good) is what you say to congratulate someone on an achievement. Two Golden Globes? Mazel tov!

The show, set in Manhattan in 1958, is itself a congratulatory celebration of Jewish success in post-World War II America. Miriam (aka Midge) Maisel, played brilliantly by Rachel Brosnahan, is the daughter of a Columbia math professor who works on the side for Bell Labs. Her father-in-law, up from Brooklyn, owns a successful clothing factory.

(There’s a sly flashback to a scene from Midge’s wedding in which four clearly professional dancers entertain the crowd with Old Country-inspired numbers. Midge delights her new husband by admitting that she’s hired them from The Pajama Game, the Broadway musical about a union campaign for higher wages at a Garment District pajama factory.)

In Protestant-Catholic-Jew (1955), Will Herberg famously argued that while ethnic differences were disappearing in America, religion had “become the differentiating element and the context of self-identification and social location.” Without a doubt, Midge’s synagogue-going community fits that bill.

They hang together and don’t want their children to marry outside the faith, even as they embrace American society and culture. And in New York City, the only place in America where Protestants, Catholics and Jews exist on demographically equal terms, they can have it all.

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Great show! Well worth a binge!

[bronxiteforever]

1. Rachel Brosnahan is a force of nature. Tony Shalhoub Is hysterical.

Great funny and touching series.

[JDC]

2. They are both great.

"When I was 3 years old I could re-sole a shoe...". Shalhoub is perfect for that role.

[RainCaster]

3. I love this show!

My wife and I binged our way through this very quickly, and it ended... far too soon. The cultural humor was not over the top, the characters charming and somewhat three dimensional. Very expensive production. Find a way to see it- you will not be disappointed.

[dixiegrrrrl]

4. I saw the pilot and loved it, then had to wait for the series to begin.

Which I greedily binged on and may watch again.
It is marvelous! So deserving of the awards.

[secondwind]

5. We are enjoying it very much.