Borscht Belt Barbie: Jewish American Princess and Postfeminist Sensibility in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel

Abstract

The Jewish American Princess (JAP) stereotype is a well-established pattern in American popular culture. Characters exemplifying this stereotype can be found in such classics as Dirty Dancing, Friends, or Clueless. More recent TV representations of JAPs try to revitalize the stereotype and bring it up to date. Despite being set in the 1950s and 1960s, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel shows its viewers a character who, in her comedic career, proclaims views in line with what Rosalind Gill calls postfeminist sensibility. A comparison of the main character and other female characters and the exploration of her comedic material reveals how the show's creators try to reclaim the JAP stereotype by combining the figure of a Jewish American Princess with a persona of a contemporary Jewish female comedian.

Headnote

Abstract: The Jewish American Princess (JAP) stereotype is a well-established pattern in American popular culture. Characters exemplifying this stereotype can be found in such classics as Dirty Dancing, Friends, or Clueless. More recent TV representations of JAPs try to revitalize the stereotype and bring it up to date. Despite being set in the 1950s and 1960s, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel shows its viewers a character who, in her comedic career, proclaims views in line with what Rosalind Gill calls postfeminist sensibility. A comparison of the main character and other female characters and the exploration of her comedic material reveals how the show's creators try to reclaim the JAP stereotype by combining the figure of a Jewish American Princess with a persona of a contemporary Jewish female comedian.

Keywords: Jewish American Princess, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, stereotyping, comedy, American television

In her 2010 article about Jewish comediennes, Joyce Antler wrote, "while the predominance of Jews in American comedy is well-known... Jewish womens comedy has largely gone unnoticed" (Antler 125). The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (2017-2023), a TV show about a Jewish female comedian in the late 1950s and early 1960s, tries to patch this gap. The show premiered at a time in American pop culture when Jewish female creators celebrated triumphs in TV, film, and stand-up comedy. As audiences are no longer satisfied with one-dimensional female characters and the Peak TV era presents viewers with more and more choices, these Jewish comediennes offer a fresh take on femininity. Mrs. Maisel follows in the footsteps of these blunt female comics. Still, by placing its story in mid-century America, it gives its viewers a glimpse into the making of the long tradition behind Jewish female entertainers. However, as for years Jewish women in the media have been viewed through the lens of stereotypes associated with American Jews, such as the Jewish Mother and the Jewish American Princess, it is almost impossible to avoid this stereotypical line of thinking when creating a Jewish female character on screen. Instead of avoiding the stereotype altogether, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel plays with it. As the show combines the persona of a Jewish female comedian with a Jewish American Princess stereotype and tries to embrace some of the stereotypically "JAPy" characteristics, it balances the fine line between reappropriation and reinforcement of the stereotype. It also tries to subscribe to the ideas of what Rosalind Gill calls postfeminist sensibility, creating its main character as a feminine and desirable career woman, which paradoxically renders second-wave feminism obsolete (Gill "Postfeminist Media Culture"). While potentially entertaining, such a play with history is questionable and dangerous because it seems apolitical.

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel offers an optimistic and colorful rendition of mid-century America. This historical show does not aim to be historically accurate; instead, it filters contemporary sensibilities onto the past, making the wishful thinking of these times into reality. Created by Amy Sherman-Palladino and Daniel Palladino, best known for Gilmore Girls, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel tells the story of Miriam "Midge" Maisel, a housewife and mother of two in her twenties whom her husband Joel abruptly leaves. Joel tells Midge that he is having an affair with his secretary Penny Pann, packs a few of his belongings into Midge's suitcase, and leaves her on Yom Kippur. Distraught, Midge gets drunk with a bottle of kosher wine, goes to Gaslight, a downtown club she used to attend with her husband, and accidentally gets on stage. After she starts talking about her life, one of the club's employees, Susie, notices her natural talent for comedy. The two become partners, with Midge pursuing a career as a stand-up comedian and Susie becoming her manager. The show, which has won three Golden Globes and 20 Emmys, is often praised for its colorful and carefully curated world. While it is often criticized for lacking historical accuracy and depicting the 1950s without nuance, it offers viewers a vignette of the mid-century comedy scene.

"Bawdy" Comedy Scene

As the audience follows Miriam's journey from a housewife to a stand-up comedian, the creators weave in real-life comedians of the era, either by dropping their names, for example, Nichols and May, or by developing them as episodic characters such as Lenny Bruce. Although Midge's story is fictional, it is based on many other real-life Jewish female comedians. Mollie Picon, Sophie Tucker, and Fanny Brice were among the first prominent Jewish female comics in the United States. They started their careers in the early 1900s (which lasted eighty, sixty, and forty years respectively), performing in vaudeville, musical revues, Yiddish theater, film, and radio. Described by critics as "bawdy," they talked about issues relevant to women. As June Sochen writes, "Sophie Tucker and Fanny Brice, first-generation social satirists, presented a womanist perspective in their humor; that is to say, they were not overtly feminist but rather gave audiences the woman's point of view" (71). While they often assumed comic characters and Yiddish accents, for example, Mollie Picon played "'Yonkele' role at least '3,000 times,"' they paved the way for the next generation of Jewish female comics (Antler 126). Starting in the 1950s and 1960s, Jewish female entertainers such as Joan Rivers, Bette Midler, Barbra Streisand, or Gilda Radner became "social and sexual satirists" of their day, often subverting the stereotypes ascribed to Jewish women by male-produced literature and pop culture (Sochen 71).

Contemporary Jewish female comedians continue this tradition. Sarah Silverman, Jenny Slate, Lena Dunham, Chelsea Handler, Amy Schumer, Rachel Bloom, Ilana Glazer, and Abbi Jacobson are some of the best-known Jewish female comedians today. In their work, which includes not only stand-up but also Netflix or Prime Video comedy specials, TV shows, and movies, they talk about topics such as dating, sex, and pregnancy in a straightforward and relatable way. These bawdy creators offer a feminist critique of sexism and the societal norms modern women are expected to meet. Often playing with the genres and tropes that perpetuate postfeminist ideas in the media (such as romantic comedies or the makeover paradigm), Inside Amy Schumer and Rachel Bloom's musical comedy Crazy ExGirlfriend offer a voice in the discussion about contemporary gender roles and stereotypes. Although, according to Shaina Hammerman, these Jewish comedians "are marked first as women and only secondarily, parenthetically as Jewish," Jewishness is a big part of their comedy (62). Crazy Ex-Girlfriend offers songs that candidly (and sometimes stereotypically) talk about Jewish American experiences: a demanding Jewish mother ("Where's the Bathroom?"), intergenerational trauma ("Remember That We Suffered") or Jewish American Princesses ("JAP Battle Rap" and "JAP Battle Rap Reprise"). However, according to Samantha Pickette, who writes about the representation of Jewish femininity in Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, "Jewishness in Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, then, is less of an ethnic or even cultural identity and more of a series of stereotypes underscored by the implication that there is, in fact, an innate difference between "normal" people and "hysterical" Jews" (67). As The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel offers an array of comedic Jewish characters, and like Crazy Ex-Girlfriend tries to position its main character as a modern Jewish American Princess, it is pertinent to better understand this show's take on contemporary Jewish female comedy and the idea of (Jewish) femininity it tries to promote.

The Making of a Jewish American Princess

"Daddy the doctor, Daddy the lawyer, Daddy the businessman," in coining these terms, Anna Sequoia put the whole idea of a Jewish American Princess stereotype into one smooth phrase (Sequoia 182). The Jewish American Princess, the bearer and expression of the (often undesirable) middle-class values, cannot exist without the men in her life who finance her lavish lifestyle. While the more recent examples of Jewish American Princesses in pop culture explore the idea of the JAP becoming independent (e.g., Rachel in the TV show Friends), there is no JAP without the Daddy. The Daddy, or rather what he symbolizes that is the financial stability and the support of a family as well as JAP's middle-class background, conditions her to become an entitled young woman. The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel shows how complex this dependence is. Unlike most representations of JAPs on screen, the show goes a step further to include not just the Daddy in this exploration of its heroine's background but her entire family.

In an interview with the Today show, Rachel Brosnahan, the actress portraying Midge Maisel, said, "Amy Sherman-Palladino, who created the show, always said to me that Midge is the kind of woman who aspires to be exactly like her mother," who wants to "have exactly the kind of life that she does" ("The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel Stars Reveal"). When the audience first meets Mrs. Maisel, this is precisely the kind of life she has. In season one's pilot episode, Midge is depicted as a young woman who is not only focused on her family life but who excels at it and seems happy in the role of a wife and mother. After completing Bryn Mawr College and getting married, Midge is hosting Rabbi for Yom Kippur and makes the perfect brisket to get her husband a better time slot at the Gaslight. She also makes diligent notes to help him improve his act, measures herself to make sure she is "proportional," and performs a complicated bedtime routine meant to ensure that her husband never sees her without make-up or with hair rollers on ("Pilot"). What Midge aspires to is the kind of womanhood that her mother Rose has mastered to perfection and which the popular culture of the 1950s promoted. As Pamela Nadell described it:

Among the most powerful female images of this era were television's contented suburban middle-class mothers.... As they baked and vacuumed wearing dresses and pearls, they embodied the idealized, glamorous, and also sexualized 1950s wife and mother, whose happiness lay in her meticulous housekeeping, bright and talented children, and with her loving and invariably wiser husband (391).

This mid-century focus on fashion and beauty was also at the center of the most visible aspect of the Jewish American Princess stereotype: clothes. However, clothes convey more meaning in this context than just the 1950s feminine ideals and materialism. While consumerism at the time was rampant, clothes also played a considerable role in the assimilation of American Jews. As Shirli Brautbar argues, "Jewish immigrants had used fashion as a means of assimilating and integrating into mainstream American life from the nineteenth century onward" (80). In this case, "fashion" does not just mean glamorous outfits but also the making of the garments. The Jewish immigrants of the 19th and early 20th centuries often arrived in America as skilled tailors (due to discrimination in their home countries, often one of the few available professions) (Sachar). Therefore, it is no surprise that American Jews became not only prominent owners of sweatshops in the garment industry (primarily German Jews) but also its workers (Eastern European Jews). Those included young Jewish women working for minimal pay in atrocious conditions, which sometimes ended in tragedy, as exemplified by the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire.

Nevertheless, these young, working-class Jewish women also tried assimilating into American society by dressing up, often mimicking the American lifestyle. This phenomenon resulted in the Ghetto Girl stereotype. While the Ghetto Girls were described as having an affinity for fashion, "intent on being stylish Americans," they were also accused of "lack of taste" (Prell 25, 50). A problem that some commentators attributed to the difficulties of dressing the "Oriental body" (Prell 50). However, this negative attitude toward Ghetto Girls can be explained by the Jewish community's anxieties. Not only about adjusting to American society and blending in but also about being abandoned by these independent women who would use their wages for other purposes rather than supporting their families, "The Lower East Side had no Prince Charmings with wealth to underwrite palaces, fancy cars, and other pleasures. Beneath the ridicule of these young women is an unmistakable anxiety about women not staying behind to share with their peers a life without such possibilities" (Prell 37). Additionally, Ghetto Girls were seen as a threat to Jewish men's economic viability, "[t]he very gender dynamic that Jews embraced in order to Americanize suggested that women's desires would be supported by the economic productivity of a husband" (Prell 29). These Jewish women were "icons of Americanization" (Prell 57).

Ghetto Girl, the forebear of the Jewish American Princess in the pandemonium of Jewish women stereotypes, shows how essential clothes have been for generations of Jewish women in America who used them as a means for climbing the social ladder and becoming "true" Americans. In the case of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, this is further highlighted by the fact that Midge's father-inlaw, Moishe Maisel, owns a garment factory. Midge indirectly (through her fatherin-law and husband) profits from this business, yet is removed from its essence. When Joel delivers Halloween costumes for their kids in one of the episodes, the show indicates that Midge probably cannot sew herself. She is at least one generation removed from the reality of sweatshops and Ghetto Girls. Instead, the glamour of her persona is further proof of the acceptance American Jews enjoyed in the postwar period.

However, Midge is much more a 21st-century woman than the 1950s housewife the audience sees in the pilot episode. As she becomes more independent and begins a comedy career, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel offers a modern rendition of a Jewish American Princess stereotype which embraces the "JAPy" characteristics, such as affinity for clothes, paying much attention to one's looks, and privilege, known from previous representations of JAPs such as Marjorie Morningstar, Clueless or Dirty Dancing. These characteristics stem from her socioeconomic background and would not be possible without her family.

When her husband announces that he leaves her and life as she knew it shutters, the first thing that Midge does is run to her parents, who live in the same building. Midge depends on her parents often, not only in moments of crisis but also in everyday tasks such as childcare. It is the life that she always planned for herself, as she says in one of the flashbacks to her engagement with Joel, "I can be a cool chick with a doorman and a Kelvinator Foodarama refrigerator, can't I?.... My parents are so close. When we have kids, we can just go upstairs, drop them off, go downtown, and be cool cats by night" ("Ya Shivu"). When she has to move out of her apartment, the natural next step is to move back in with her parents, whose maid takes care of all the chores and Midge's children. Midge gets a separate room for her clothes which are an essential part of her character, as the show likes to remind its viewers. Always dressed to perfection, Midge shares her love for fashion with her mother, who "gets her things" and makes sure her daughter always looks perfect ("The Disappointment"). Their relationship resembles that of Marjorie and Mrs. Morgenstern's who are also shown bonding over clothes. Midge's similarities to this classic representation of JAP do not end there. She is also bound to marry a doctor and dreams of a career in show business. Just like Marjorie, Midge is conditioned by her upbringing to become the Jewish American Princess. Privileged and naive, she does not have to work to survive. Earning money is about satisfying her whims, like buying a TV, and a comedy career is about following her dreams. That is until her parents decide to leave behind their stable life, a choice which inadvertently causes Midge to face the realities of adulthood. After her father gives up his tenure at Columbia University and her mother her wealthy, oil-fortune family's support, the Weissmans are essentially penniless and homeless. Suddenly, Midge is the one who literally provides a roof over their heads by taking out a loan for her old Upper West Side apartment, and she is the breadwinner who worries about paying the bills. Nevertheless, this monumental change in her life does not happen of her own volition. Instead, just like her privilege and glamorous lifestyle, it is decided for her by her parents' choices.

The Postfeminist 1950s Dream

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel's aesthetic helps the creators paint Miriam as a Jewish American Princess, but it also helps to show the world of mid-century comedy. The show is set at a time when stand-up, as it is known today, was developing and when comics such as Joan Rivers were revolutionizing their field and women's position in it. Mrs. Maisel attempts to invite its viewers to comedy clubs to learn about iconic comedians, focusing on a specific industry while showcasing the beautiful 1950s. However, the show's aestheticization, i.e., its glamorous costumes, sets, and cinematic frames, are mostly just smoke and mirrors for its flippant attitude towards historical accuracy and depicting a postfeminist character in pre-feminist times. While some critics praised the show for this approach, observing that "[t] he dialogue is sprinkled with anachronisms, but they don't detract from the whole, because there is the clear sense that this is a created thing, a beautiful illusion composed of elements put together not to instruct but to please," others saw this "beautiful illusion" as a severe flaw (Flanagan). In her review for The New Yorker, Emily Nussbaum acutely points out all of the show's imperfections. Nussbaum writes that even though the show tries to position itself as somewhat feminist, it mostly ignores all the unpleasant aspects of the 1950s and is inconsequential in its portrayal of sexism. It puts Midge on a pedestal, creating her to be the perfect character who can do no wrong, "The show is downright Sorkinian in its emphasis on Midge's superiority-and more than a bit Streisandian, too, except that Midge starts and ends as a swan" (Nussbaum).

In order to underline Midge's superiority, the creators introduce a cast of supporting female characters who create the background for Mrs. Maisel. While the show's heroine might go through her own trials and tribulations, the viewers are always left feeling that she will get a happy ending and that no matter what happens, she is still the most successful of them all. All her female friends and competitors are never quite as good at their jobs, fashionable, funny, or capable of reconciling their ambition with femininity as Midge is. This is further underlined by her seemingly easy solutions and obvious observations in her comedy routine, which espouse the postfeminist sensibility. As understood by Rosalind Gill, postfeminist sensibility is characterized by neoliberalism and individualism, femininity as a bodily property, sexualization of culture and women's sexual subjectivity, as well as reassertion of sexual difference (Gill "Postfeminist Media Culture"). As much as Midge is inspired by real-life mid-century entertainers such as Joan Rivers, Barbra Streisand, or Lenny Bruce, a recurring character on the show, Mrs. Maisel's material is geared towards contemporary viewers. Monologues about sex, motherhood, or discrimination against women often feel like guidelines and commentary on contemporary problems. As they make the character stray further from her Jewish American Princess roots, they put her more firmly into the position of a (post) feminist savior.

I Enjoy Being a (Jewish) Girl: Midge and Other Women of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel

The show portrays Midge as an ambitious career woman and a mother who simply "enjoys being a girl" and makes it look like it is incredibly easy to meet society's expectations (Foster). However, Midge's status as "marvelous" would not be as visible if it was not for other women in the show because, as Marjorie Jolies writes, "The rule-breaker may be a figure of strong individuality, but the achievement of this individualism relies on the fundamentally relational structure of her subjectivity; for the rule-breaker is only intelligible by virtue of the existence of masses of rule-followers against whom she defines and measures herself" (Jolies 50). Susie, Penny Pann, Sophie Lennon, Imogen, Carole Keen, or her colleagues from the department store B. Altman represent femininities that are either in opposition to or are incomplete versions of Midge's take on womanhood. They also highlight her Jewishness either because they are not Jewish themselves or because their Jewishness is not explicit. They all serve as a background that is supposed to elevate Midge as the only one who is doing it right.

The show's carefully curated aesthetic would not be complete without its soundtrack which underlines the sugar-coated fantasy of the show as well as its characters' personas. Such is the case with "I Enjoy Being a Girl." The song is featured twice in season one of the show. In episode five it accompanies Midge's first visit to B. Altman as she applies for a job and eventually becomes a new "make-up counter girl" ("Doink"). Midge, wearing a dress with red lipstick on, twirls in the streets of New York City and feels at home in the department store. The song is featured for the second time in episode six of season one when Susie walks into B. Altman for the first time. Unlike Midge, she is out of place at a department store, and the song underlines that. As Sutton Foster sings, "I'm strictly a female female" Susie walks into the store, throws a cigarette onto the floor, and puts it out with her shoe. Unlike the tall and slim Midge, she is short, and wears grey pants, a shirt, a blue bomber jacket, and a paper boy hat, items that do not resemble women's fashion of the 1950s ("Mrs. X at the Gaslight"). Rather they make her look masculine, which is an ongoing joke throughout the show, with multiple characters mistaking her for a man. Susie's refusal to adhere to the "ladylike" norms is also visible in her behavior, as she is straightforward and often rude. She lives in a tiny and neglected apartment she can barely afford. Her lack of feminine touch is played for laughs when she sublets her place to Jackie, her male coworker from the Gaslight, who makes the place look clean and put-together. Although Susie is a butch woman, the show does not (until the final season) pay much attention to her identity or sexuality.

Coming from a working-class family who lives in the Rockaways, Susie does not have the kind of support system that Midge enjoys. This is often juxtaposed with Midge's privilege, for which Susie's character works as a factcheck. While Midge often looks back fondly to her childhood memories and treats every situation with unstoppable optimism, Susie's outlook on life is informed by hardship. When they go on tour in season two, and Midge comments that sleeping in the same room is like a sleepover, Susie offhandedly mentions childhood sexual abuse ("Someday..."). When Harry Drake blacklists Midge from most clubs in the city, and Susie says they need to start making money, Midge says, "Don't worry about me, I'm fine." Susie quickly brings her back to reality:

Oh, are you, Princess? You hanging in there? Is life okay in your 18-room apartment on the Upper West Side with your doorman and your maid and your childcare and your bottomless closet?.... I'm not gonna find $2,000 in my closet. Think about my life for a moment. I'm broke.... I'm begging people to call me 'cause I can't afford to call them. I am picking up halfeaten apples out of trash cans at the Port Authority. It's getting dire here. ("The Punishment Room")

The realities of Susie's life reveal the fantasy that is Midge's effortless lifestyle and show how clueless she is about her privilege. However, while the show focuses a lot on the "Princess" part of this juxtaposition, it mostly ignores the question of Jewishness. Even though Amy Sherman-Palladino claims that Susie Myerson is a Jewish character which would suggest that the show depicts the diversity of American Jewry, Susie is never shown as a practicing Jew or even explicitly Jewish culturally (Burack). When she talks about Jewishness, it is unclear if she identifies as a Jew. While The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel is unapologetic about its depictions of Jewishness, it is only the wealthy Jews that are clearly described as Jewish. Midge's model minority Jewishness is all the more visible thanks to Susie Myerson but also thanks to the non-Jewish women in the show.

Miriam Maisel is the colorful, somewhat exotic character who is the unsurpassed ideal to other women and an object of desire to men, a modern Beautiful Jewess. By comparison, the non-Jewish women in the show look bleak or express archaic views. Her colleagues at B. Altman are always dressed in toneddown colors and never quite as good at their jobs as Miriam. Imogene, the goyish friend who is blonde and focused on motherhood, personifies the domesticity Midge has left behind, and even when the show hints that she is going to follow in Midge's footsteps of pursuing a career, she signs up for secretarial school, a more realistic choice than Midge's glamorous career in comedy. Yet, the most significant contrast is drawn between Midge and Penny Pann.

Penny, whom Midge describes as "dumb as a Brillo pad," is an example of the shiksa stereotype, the woman who is "sweet and less demanding, quieter, not like the Jewish mothers, less bossy" (Klein). The type of woman who attracts Jewish men as "exotic sirens, femmes fatales, humble servants, Christian saints, victims, and American goddesses" (Copie Jäher 520). However, as Moishe describes her: "She's young, she's empty headed, she doesn't eat. She's a shiksa. Shiksas are for practice" ("Doink"). Penny is an incomplete version of Midge, "the Methodist version of me," who makes pot roast "the Methodist version of brisket," has almost no lines in the show and is clearly lost when facing Midge with her fast-talking and witty remarks. Rather she embodies Joel's insecurities.

Joel leaving Midge for a non-Jewish woman, or for "pot roast and Santa Claus," feels like a threat to this ethnic identity and Jewish continuity, "Don't baptize him [Ethan] while I'm gone" ("The Disappointment"). According to Karen Brodkin, the responsibilities and pressures of assuring Jewish continuity were "increasingly turned over to women" (Brodkin 150). Penny underlines Midge's unfettered relationship with her Jewishness even though the show hints that she was not embracing her identity in such an unapologetic way when she was younger. As the flashbacks to her college years reveal, she was dying her hair blonde and wanted to marry a goy, "I was going to meet a man-a perfect man. He would be 6'4" and blond, and his name would be Dashiell or Stafford" ("Pilot"). However, when the audience meets her, she is already at peace with her identity as a Jewish woman and is not afraid to be vocal about it.

Her embrace of Jewishness is also visible in her career on stage. Even though in the 1950s and 1960s it was common practice to change a Jewish-sounding name to something more inconspicuous, for example, Joan Rivers changed her name from Molinsky, the name Maisel is embraced by Midge, and her Jewishness is often the subject of her stand-up in a very explicit way. When during one of her standups, a man tells her to "Go home and clean the kitchen!" Midge responds with, "Oh, sir, I'm Jewish. I pay people to do that" ("Thank You and Good Night"). Midge is portrayed not only as a proud Jew but also as an authentic persona on stage, directly opposing Sophie Lennon.

Sophie Lennon is the only other female comic character the show presents to the audience. It depicts her as a WASP-y imposter in direct opposition to Midge's honest, JAP-y on-stage persona. Sophie is a successful veteran of the comedy world and a childhood idol of Midge. On stage, she assumes the role of a homely, obese housewife from Queens whose humor is mostly self-deprecating and focuses on her weight. Yet, when Midge is invited to her house, she discovers that this is just a stage character. Sophie, poised and elegant, lives in an Upper East Side townhouse with butlers at her every whim, is skinny and eats only lemon wedges or Jell-O, and has never actually been to Queens. She asks Susie, "Tell me, is that really how they talk?" She is a graduate of Yale Drama School and dreams of a serious acting career, a dream she later fails at. Her career is based on the premise that women cannot be funny unless they make themselves unattractive. She asks Midge, "What is your gimmick?" When Midge says she does not do that, she claims it will not work: "No one wants that.... The mainstreamers, the people from Pacoima, the people who buy the dish soap and the dog food, who pay for the Modigliani's- they want a character." When Midge points out that male comics do not have characters, Sophie replies, "They have dicks. Do you have a dick?.... Darling, look at you. I mean, really-men don't want to laugh at you. They want to fuck you. You can't go up there and be a woman. You've got to be a thing. You want to get ahead in comedy? Cover up that hole" ("Put That on Your Plate!"). Sophie represents an earlier generation of female comics (the likes of Sophie Tucker or Fanny Brice), those who started in vaudeville when their only chance at a successful career as women was caricaturing themselves. However, in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, she represents internalized sexism and an archaic point of view that Midge repudiates. Later in the same episode, in her stand-up, Midge calls Sophie out as a fat-suit-wearing snob who tells her that "men won't think Tm funny because I don't look like a dump truck?" Midge directly disputes Sophie's words, calling out the unrealistic norms women are supposed to aspire to: "Why do women have to pretend to be something that they're not? Why do we have to pretend to be stupid when we're not stupid? Why do we have to pretend to be helpless when we're not helpless? Why do we have to pretend to be sorry when we have nothing to be sorry about? Why do we have to pretend we're not hungry when we're hungry?" ("Put That on Your Plate!"). Even though Midge embodies those unrealistic expectations, in her comedic career, she is portrayed as a (post) feminist savior who brings enlightenment to the 1950s patriarchy. However, as much as the show is trying to underline Midge's exceptionality, in season three, it introduces a character that reveals Mrs. Maisel may not be such a trailblazer after all.

Carole Keen guides Midge through the meanders of show business and is supposed to display a different approach to being a career woman. A blonde, petite woman with an updo and cat-eye glasses, she has a no-nonsense approach to her life and career as a bass player. When Midge first meets her, she sends a man away from the doorstep of her hotel room. When the two women talk later, she says, "He's handsy but harmless" ("Panty Pose"). From their very first conversation, it is clear that Carole, the only other white woman in Shy Baldwin's band, is supposed to be Midge's guide to the world of touring and navigating the male-dominated show business as an attractive young woman and a working mother. When they meet again in a hotel corridor, and Carole invites Midge for a drink and room service food charged to handsy Howards' bill, the two women share their struggles with being homesick and reconciling their careers with motherhood. They are portrayed as two women against male-dominated industry, and the aspect of sisterhood is underlined when Carole toasts Midge by saying, "To someone with tits to talk to." As she gives Midge a rundown of the rules of the road, which include keeping slippers behind the bandstand, "Fuzzy ones, rabbit ears," and "the skinny on onenight stands," with advice on how to protect herself and what makes a good weapon "High heels are great, and they never see it coming," it is clear that Carole Keen is a woman who knows how to maneuver the "real world." The tips she shares with Midge reveal her approach, "They can't think you're a girly girl" ("It's Comedy or Cabbage"). Unlike Midge, who makes her famous brisket in a hotel kitchen for the entire band, Carole does not know how to be a "female female" (Foster). She does not know how to knit but does that anyway because, as she says, "It's a woman's work" ("Kind of Bleau"). Like all the other female characters in the show, she is an incomplete version of Midge's womanhood. However, instead of adopting the more "traditional" characteristics the woman of the 1950s is supposed to espouse, this character goes to the other extreme. She is the already liberated, independent woman who does not feel guilty about leaving her kids with her mother, "the queen of apple strudel" when she goes to work, yet she still feels like she needs to be more feminine. The purpose of this is to yet again elevate Midge as a character who checks all the boxes of the perfect female of postfeminist pop culture.

The women of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel offer a variety of different takes on femininity and womanhood. They are either accepting the societal roles ascribed to women without any protest (Penny Pann, Imogene), completely rebelling against them (Susie), or selectively applying them for their own purposes (Sophie Lennon, Carole Keen). Yet, the show is clear that none of these characters can come close enough to being Midge, the woman who always successfully draws from these various femininities to become the postfeminist heroine who seemingly subverts the stereotypes she is so clearly inspired by. Midge's comedic career shows this attempt in a nutshell and displays the rich history of female Jewish entertainers.

Borscht Belt Barbie: Midge's Postfeminist Comedy

When Susie and Midge enter a Florida hotel during the tour with Shy Baldwin in season three, Midge sees a "staircase to nowhere." A staircase that is "there just so the ladies can walk down in their finest dresses and everybody can watch them." Susie is eager to hear Midge's stand-up on this "completely asinine" invention but quickly realizes that Midge does not intend to make fun of it but instead wants to use it to show off her new outfits. As Susie comments, "I never know when Borsht Belt Barbie's gonna come back out," the audience is reminded that despite Midge's development over the seasons, she is still a Jewish American Princess ("It's Comedy or Cabbage"). Although Midge is pursuing a career in comedy and, in many ways, becoming more mature and leaving behind some of her "JAPy" characteristics, she is still a character deeply embedded in her privilege and her Jewish American Princess roots. Even though the show tries to repudiate some of her JAP characteristics, it quickly replaces them with other equally archetypal traits that are in line with the postfeminist sensibility and the expectations toward women (characters) in media, such as being an "active, desiring sexual subject," having a "fit" body, and a successful career (Gill, "Postfeminist Media Culture" 151). However, the "Borscht Belt" part of this designation also indicates the roots of Midge's comedy and partially explains its feminist undertones.

From the very beginning of the show, it is clear that Midge Maisel is informed by the female Jewish comics of the 20th century. Midge's character is derived from stories of such women as Sophie Tucker, Fanny Brice, Joan Rivers, or Barbra Streisand. Yet, most importantly she is made to be a representative of this second wave of Jewish female comics who embodied "A new style of female Jewish comedy-fast-paced, hip, and deeply satirical-emerged to replace the pioneering women comics of the previous generation. The new style of comedy ushered in by a group of talented satirists, male and female-Lenny Bruce, Mort Sahl, Shelley Berman, and the extraordinary Mike Nichols and Elaine May" (Antler 129). The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel plays with the history of the mid-century comedy world with mentions of Nichols and May, and Lenny Bruce being a constant presence in Midge's career.

Like Joan Rivers, Midge is often painted as the trailblazer in comedy, mimicking the actions of those real-life female comedians whom June Sochen called "reformers," "Jewish women bawds turn their humor inward as well as on forbidden subjects such as women's sexuality. Their satire is both personal and social" (69). Evaluating their influence, Sochen wrote that they "upset social expectations, reversed sex roles, and behaved in unconventional (at times outrageous) ways" (70). According to Joyce Antler, "Many of these comedians center their humor in a specifically female-and often feminist-point of view that showcases issues of particular relevance to women" (Antler 125). In her stand-up routine, Midge focuses primarily on these "specifically female" subjects. She shows a sanitary belt on stage, talks about expectations towards mothers, and birth control, "There's a new thing called a birth control pill. Have you heard of it? It's just a little pill, and when you take it, you can have sex all you want and not get pregnant. However, only married women are allowed to take it. You know, women who don't want to have sex. Who says the Food and Drug Administration doesn't have a sense of humor" ("Kind of Bleau"). She also calls out the double standards and sexism of the 1950s. When she is doing her first gig outside of the Gaslight, and she is patronized and objectified by male comics, she gets on stage and calls out the dominance of men in comedy,

All comics are comics cause something in their lives went horribly wrong.... But men, those over there and men in general, think that they are the only ones who get to use comedy to close up those holes in their soul. They run around telling everyone that women aren't funny, only men are funny. Now think about this. Comedy is fueled by oppression, by the lack of power, by sadness and disappointment, by abandonment and humiliation. Now, who the hell does that describe more than women? Judging by those standards, only women should be funny. ("Mid-way to Mid-town")

The show is eager to point out that the comedy world of the 1950s is sexist, but it does that in a somewhat exaggerated fashion, almost as if it was realizing every woman's fantasy of a witty remark to misogynistic comments. In her text "Postfeminist Nostalgia for a Prefeminist Future" Lynn Spigel described the popularity of the 1950s-centered shows among young female audiences on the example of Mad Men,

Rather than charting a course for feminism, Mad Men charts a teleology for postfeminism. It provides a vision of the past in which women of the 1960s were already hoping to be postfeminists: independent, career-focused, yet hyperbolically 'feminine' in their embrace of fashion, shopping and dating. Perhaps Mad Men's postfeminist nostalgia appeals to many contemporary women because it validates the present by giving postfeminism a heritage (it is what our mothers hoped for), and with that, it portrays postfeminism as a form of inevitable progress: a female future perfect circa 1962. (273)

In the same stand-up in which Midge talks about male comics she starts by saying, "I don't feel ready, mentally, to have my own keys, my own plumbing, my own angry Ukrainian super. I don't feel prepared to take on that kind of responsibility alone. The only thing I feel prepared to take on, right now, at this very minute, is those fucking losers at the bar. I mean look at them" ("Mid-way to Mid-town"). As this line reveals, Midge's feminism is more about boasting the seemingly easy solutions without any action. Midge represents pop feminism that Rosalind Gill describes in this way, "First it is conveyed through a warm and enthusiastic embrace of all things female-by "championing" women and "celebrating" their "intelligence," beauty, and "confidence".... Secondly, feminism is signified in what has been described as a distinctly postfeminist fashion through an attitudinal pose of assertiveness and defiance" (Gill "Post-postfeminism?" 14). Midge, with her phrase "Tits up!" represents this approach indicative of confidence culture but offers little substance to her feminist pleas. She claims that women are distracted by shoe ads when reading newspapers and does not know what is going on in politics, "What's happening with voting?" ("Because You Left"). Although over the course of the show, she seems to be more aware of the political situation in the United States, she is still often portrayed as bewildered by politics, in a similar fashion to Clueless' Cher. While she is excited about a woman running for Congress, she does not realize what Phyllis Schlafly stands for. Midge might be coming out of her JAP bubble and becoming more interested in the world around her, but she is still primarily focused on being a "female female."

Along with underlining her excessive femininity, Midge's JAP characteristics are also repudiated by the show's portrayal of her sexuality. According to Riv-Ellen Prell, one of the key JAP traits is that she is "sexually passive; she does not move, respond, or express pleasure in her sexual relationships" (184). Unlike the JAP of the 1960s who "denies her partner sexual pleasure, and appears to be indifferent to it," Midge is depicted as embracing her sexuality (Prell 182). Already in the pilot episode, the show puts her in opposition to this preconception as she says in her stand-up, "I loved him. And I showed him I loved him. All that shit they say about Jewish girls in the bedroom? Not true. There are French whores standing around the Marais District saying 'Did you hear what Midge did to Joel's balls the other night?"' ("Pilot"). This kind of remark aligns with the comedy produced by Jewish female comics of the 1950s and 1960s. As Hannah Schwadron writes, "Their bodily humor likewise offered a total reversal of the Kinsey Reports, released in 1948 and again in 1953, on the sexual behavior of thousands of interviewed women, which documented that women had less sex than men. These frank and sassy Tucker-esque performers configured an altogether alternative realm of the sexually expressive female body for middle-class audiences" (65). Yet, Midge's sexual freedom and the show's clear stance on it is also about conforming to the postfeminist ideal of womanhood which is characterized by "the sexually autonomous heterosexual young woman who plays with her sexual power and is forever up for it'" (Gill, "Postfeminist Media Culture" 151).

Furthermore, unlike those Jewish female entertainers, Midge does not struggle with her imperfect body. While Barbara Streisand's Fanny Brice was turning towards comedy because, as she sang, "it hurt my pride, the groom was prettier than the bride," Midge does not have those kinds of problems (Streisand). Contrary, she is already looking perfect, trained by her mother to be ladylike in every aspect other life. According to Rosalind Gill, "in today's media, possession of a 'sexy body' is presented as women's key (if not sole) source of identity. The body is presented simultaneously as women's source of power and as always unruly, requiring constant monitoring, surveillance, discipline and remodeling (and consumer spending) in order to conform to ever-narrower judgements of female attractiveness" (Gill, "Postfeminist Media Culture" 149). The decision to cast Rachel Brosnahan with her "sexy body" instead of the awkwardness and other bodily struggles so often attributed to the Jewish women, for example, unruly hair or the nose, is in line with the idea that women on screen should always look impeccable. The show sometimes tries to break the veneer of Midge's supposed perfection. In season two, Susie tells Midge that she is "a little pungent," Midge replies bewildered, "I am not pungent. Never. Never. I have never in my life been..." ("Mid-way to Mid-town"). Even though sometimes, just like with any other aspect of her life, Midge has to grapple with her corporeality, these are minor incidents, and the audience still mostly sees her done to perfection. However, what escapes Mrs. Maisel's strive for perfection is her relationship with her children.

Midge's femininity is not only defined by her body but also by her motherhood. The fact that she has children at all is most likely a plot device meant to tie her to her on-and-off lover and ex-husband, Joel, but it is also meant to underline her conformity to the ideals of 1950s womanhood. While the audience is told that in her "old life," Midge was primarily a mother and a wife, in her "new life" post-Penny Pann, Midge's kids are only an afterthought meant to serve as an occasional joke and conveniently ignored whenever Mrs. Maisel is exploring other aspects of its main character. The kids are more involved in the plot in season three when Midge is on tour with Shy Baldwin and naturally cannot take care of them herself. Then, they underline Joel's "modern" approach to fatherhood as he becomes their primary caregiver.

The kids also serve as a reality check for Midge who, after having to move out of the Upper West Side realizes that she cannot send her kids to the private schools she wanted them to attend. At the same time she realizes that only buying her Upper West Side apartment from Moishe would allow her to lead the life she envisioned for herself, "I want to decide where my children grow up and where they go to school. I love that apartment. I want to own it. I want to buy it with the money that I earned" ("A Jewish Girl"). The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel offers an ending to Midge's coming of age, as she negotiates the purchase and is realistic about her prospects. In a similar way to previous Jewish American Princesses in films, especially Clueless' Cher and Dirty Dancing's Baby, Midge is also asserting her independence while navigating her privileged background. As the show rejects some of the typical Jewish American Princess characteristics, it brings her up to date and aligns her with the postfeminist ideal of womanhood. Yet, by placing her in the 1950s, it is creating what Lynn Spiegel calls "a female future perfect" marking her journey from a prefeminist character into a postfeminist heroine without much attention to the second-wave feminism that was forming at the time the show is set in. Although Midge expresses feminist sentiment in her stand-up, the easiness with which she moves through life negates the need for that movement altogether.

Through the character of Midge, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel offers an updated take on the Jewish American Princess stereotype. Unlike some earlier representations of JAPs on-screen, Miriam embraces her privilege and "JAPy" characteristics by revising them through the lens of postfeminist sensibility She is a modern Beautiful Jewess who is always a positive exception among her peers and always ready to boast about her postfeminist views. Yet, as at the end of season three, after yet again being careless about the consequences of her actions, she is left jobless, the audience is left to wonder whether The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel's approach to life and the stereotype she exemplifies is a feasible option.

Conclusion

In Tablet Magazine's 2018 mini-documentary "Can I Say Jap?" Stephanie Butnick, the Unorthodox podcast host, said, "JAPinness is a mentality, right? It's entitlement without understanding" (Naumoff). Over the years, this mentality has been mocked and used against Jewish women. And yet, nowadays, the term is being reconsidered. As some women regard it as an irrecoverable slur, others think that rehabilitation is possible. As Jewish American Princess characters and the movies and TV shows they are featured in are still some of the most beloved ones in Hollywood's recent history, it is no surprise that contemporary creators keep reusing the patterns that make them successful.

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, with all its visual pleasures, beautiful costumes, and Midge's can-do attitude, is yet another example of this type of inspirational and aspirational tale of a young woman on a career ladder. Midge, the born Jewish American Princess, under the influence of one drunken night at a Greenwich Village club, decides to pursue a career in comedy. What follows is a series of minor setbacks and tremendous successes. As Mrs. Maisel claims on stage that women are discriminated against and that being a career woman is a difficult path, the audience rarely sees those adversities depicted on screen. While the show creates a character who claims to understand modern women's problems, Midge fails to understand her entitlement. Mrs. Maisel's postfeminist sensibility is pervasive in every aspect of the show and makes it impossible to include some of the more nuanced social commentaries. Unlike the contemporary Jewish female comics it tries to emulate, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel does not bother with activism or political stances.

Through its embrace of the "JAPy" characteristics and simultaneous idealization of Miriam, the show fails to adequately comment on the risks of bringing back the JAP stereotype. Putting Midge on the pedestal of contemporary femininity ultimately creates another cool girl. As Judith Rosenbaum, CEO of Jewish Women's Archive, points out, the Jewish American Princess stereotype "comes out of a sense of take some of the things that people are most afraid of being, and kind of push it on to somebody else that you can then vilify. And say that is unattractive, but that's not me, that's you" (Naumoff). As Mrs. Maisel tries to encourage its viewers to accept Midge's cheerful cluelessness, as exemplified in the season three finale when she thoughtlessly "outs" Shy Baldwin in front of a large audience, it risks redefining the stereotype in a way that is not necessarily positive. This aligns with what Riv- Ellen Prell writes about such attempts, "The talk-back art often reproduces the stereotypes even while using them to criticize what they represent" (Prell 211). While the reappropriation of negative stereotypes is a worthwhile concept, for a JAP to be reclaimed, she has to be unmade, essentially rendering the stereotype obsolete.

Sidebar

Karolina Kusto completed the MA program at the American Studies Center, University of Warsaw. An Erasmus+ scholar at Humboldt-Universität in Berlin in 2019 and a former HBI Gilda Slifka Intern at Brandéis University, she has worked with Professor Laura Jockusch on the project "The Trials of Stella Goldschlag." Her research interests include gender studies, race, American Jewishness, and stereotypes.

[ORCID: 0009-0007-2240-6780; email: [email protected]]

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