Tuesday, November 16, 2021
Should Hollywood rethink who plays Jews in movies and on TV?
NPR: On a new Apple TV+ show called The Shrink Next Door, a depressed and anxious businessman is convinced by his sister to go to therapy.
"He's not a stranger!" she exclaims. "Rabbi Goldberg recommended him!"
Their strong accents reflect who their characters are: New York Jews. But neither of the actors who play them — Will Ferrell and Kathryn Hahn — are Jewish in real life.
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This is kind of like the conversation about who can play queer or characters of color on screen. I don’t think a non-Jewish actor playing a Jewish character is quite the same magnitude as say White people playing POC; but it can still easily become problematic in nature. I agree that the conversation of “who’s Jewish enough” is also somewhat of a problem. Since Judaism is an ethno-religion, there are still plenty of people who practice the religion but wouldn’t be clocked as Jewish since they don’t fit the visual archetypes. So when judging who is or isn’t really Jewish I think could lead to a level of racist profiling. I don’t think that anyone in my life has ever actually assumed that I was Jewish because I’m ethnically Chinese, not white. At the same time, however, I do agree that allowing other people to play characters of this group can pretty easily lend itself to portraying anti-semetic stereotypes; and with the recent resurgence of anti-semtatism could be dangerous.
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