If you haven’t seen “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” you’re missing out. The CW’s newest show is hilarious and zany, and addresses Jewish identity in unexpectedly profound ways.
Another reason to tune in: Rachel Bloom, the show’s star and co-creator, has won a Golden Globe award for her acting in the musical comedy series.
“Ex-Girlfriend” centers on Rebecca Bunch, a successful New York lawyer who follows her summer camp ex-boyfriend to small-town California, never mind that he’s in a serious relationship with someone else. The musical comedy features lots of singing and dancing, the campy products of Rebecca’s wild imagination. These aren’t your typical Broadway numbers.
Rebecca’s Judaism is a huge part of the series, recurring in ways both explicit and subtle. Few other shows — Amazon’s “Transparent” excepted — deal with Jewish identity this deeply.
Typically on TV, Judaism is little more than a plot device — like on “Friends,” where the Jewishness of Ross and Monica Geller is most likely to come up with a token Christmastime mention of Hanukkah. Or characters like Schmidt on “New Girl,” who uses Jewish phrases all the time but typically just plays them for laughs.
On “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” Judaism is more than just a punch line — though it’s certainly that, too. This was apparent during the midseason finale, which begins on a boat from Europe to America in 1901.
“I know we are fleeing,” a mother tells her daughter, “but you couldn’t comb your hair?”
Jewish daughters will probably laugh in recognition. But what’s significant here is that the entire scene is in Yiddish. A sprinkling of Yiddish phrases may be heard on television here and there, but name another mainstream show that’s had an entire scene in the language.
For single Jewish women, the show hits another nerve: Rebecca’s mother, a perfectly cast Tovah Feldshuh, finds many ways to hint that her daughter should be married. After finding a stash of condoms, for example, she tells Rebecca she won’t get a husband “that way.”
The relationship is reminiscent of Rhoda Morgenstern, the prototypical single Jewish female, and her mother on “Rhoda,” a spinoff of “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.” Rhoda, however, never had to deal with the minefield of online dating — another cultural phenomenon that “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend” hilariously nails. In one episode, after Rebecca takes a Tinder date back to her place, she performs a slinky number with the refrain: “Hey sexy stranger, come back to my place, and I hope you’re not a murderer.”
If there’s one line that best captures how Judaism plays into the series, it’s the riposte by the mother to Rebecca’s claim that if she has a child, she would only want her to be happy.
“Our people are not about happy,” her mother says. “We’re about survival.”
In “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend,” Rebecca moves across the country to be happy, but it’s not easy. She struggles. She suffers through bad dates and endures pretty girls who poke at her self-esteem. She faces everything else life throws at her and comes out (relatively) intact on the other side. What could be more Jewish than that?
Although the ratings haven’t been great (though that may change now that Bloom has snagged a Golden Globe), CW has ordered more episodes for a total of 18 for the first season. The show returns Jan. 25, so you still have time to catch up.