Esty and her family.
Unorthodox is a four-part Netflix-produced German-American miniseries directed by Maria Schrader and streamed since March 26, 2020. It is loosely based on Deborah Feldman's 2012 memoir, Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots.
Israeli actress Shira Haas stars as 19-year-old Esther ("Esty") Shapiro, a young woman from an ultra-orthodox Jewish community in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. The show chronicles her escape from the community and flight to Berlin, alternating between flashbacks from the last year of her life showing her upbringing, unhappy marriage, and secret pursuit of music lessons, and present day, where she becomes involved with a group of music students at an elite academy and eventually reconnects with her mother, who made a similar escape years before—all while being hunted down by her husband and his more world-wise cousin.
The story tackles themes of freedom, identity, family, heritage, and finding one's voice.
Tropes appearing in Unorthodox:
- Acceptable Feminine Goals and Traits: Esty's religious community is big on enforcing these rules. Women must cover their head and wear modest clothing (always dresses); they cannot sing in public or get a job and cannot perform instruments, and their main purpose is to give birth to as many babies as possible to replace the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust.
- Alcoholic Parent: Esty's father is an alcoholic and unable to take care of her by himself, which is the main reason why she was raised by her grandparents after her mother left.
- Anorgasmia: Exaggerated. Esther suffers from vaginismus
, which makes intercourse with her husband excruciatingly painful and interferes with her cultural imperative to bear him children.- Much of their problem stems from ignorance about sex, and trying to directly have intercourse without any foreplay. Later in the series, Esty is able to sleep with another character in Berlin (who understands better how sex works) and does not have any apparent difficulty.
- Arranged Marriage: Esty and Yanky's arranged marriage is at the center of the series.
- Awful Wedded Life: Esther and Yanky's married life is untenable and a major factor in her decision to leave the community.
- Baby Factory: The holy purpose of the wives in Esty's community. Esty however doesn't see herself as a baby machine, taking offense when one of her Berlin friends characterizes Hasidic women as such.
- Badass Teacher: Esty's piano teacher is the only confidant to her escape. She gives her money and defends her fiercely when her family comes looking for her.
- Based on a Great Big Lie: The series is based on Deborah Feldman's Memoir of the same name which claims to be based on a true story, but both people who knew Feldman and other people who have left the Hasidism have accused the book of being grossly exaggerated at best. There is a webpage devoted to debunking it. A former friend of Feldman's gives her own take on things here.
- Articles by articles by women who left the Hasidism said that the show's portrayal of the Hasidic world is a "Grossly Inaccurate" caricature—both in the details it gets wrong (such as the rules relating to the eruv wire), and in the overall portrayal and atmosphere (they said that although the community is oppressive, it isn't utterly joyless and miserable all the time, and the women who can afford it dress quite stylishly).
- Black Sheep:
- Moishe has a complex relationship to his community and continues to break many of their rules even after his supposed reform—which makes him useful when someone has to go get Esty from the real world.
- Esty is this because she learns to play the piano with a Gentile teacher, and also because she doesn't get pregnant immediately after the wedding.
- Brand X: The search engine Esty uses looks very much like Google, but the word "Google" or a Google doodle is replaced by several magnifying glasses of different colors.
- Broken Bird: Esty is clearly traumatized by her recent experiences, leaving the community, and suddenly finding herself in an unknown country with no help.
- Brutal Honesty: An example of this takes place when Yael tells Esty that although she is musically inclined and plays beautifully, she is not a professional pianist and doesn't have a chance of getting the scholarship she needs. This hurts Esty at first but ends up being very helpful, as it inspires her to switch to singing for her audition instead.
- Chekhov's Gun: Moishe's gun which he left with Esty is later used by Leah to keep Moishe at bay. Ironically for this trope, it doesn’t get fired.
- Coming of Age Story: The series follows Esther coming into her own and learning to navigate the modern world.
- Fish out of Water: Both Esty and Yanky find themselves as this once they reach Berlin. The cultural and technological shock is colossal. The difference is that Esty keeps an open mind and adapts fairly quickly to the changes, while Yanky feels very uncomfortable.
- Good Girls Avoid Abortion: Despite her difficult circumstances, Esty immediately rejects her doctor's offer to help her get an abortion, and is shocked by the suggestion.
- Great Escape: Esty plans her escape carefully for months in advance, with the help of her piano teacher and documents left to her by her mother.
- History Repeats: Esty finds herself in the same situation her mother did years ago: free in Berlin, but with the community ready to take her to court for custody of her baby.
- Hopeless with Tech:
- Played for Laughs with Yanky, who, in accordance with the rules of his community, has had extremely limited exposure to technology. He is fascinated by Moishe's smartphone, without quite understanding its limitations.
Yanky: [shouting at the phone] Where is Esty, telephone??- When Esty uses a search engine for the first time, her first question is "Is there God?"
- Important Haircut:
- At the end of the first episode, Esty dramatically removes the wig she has worn since her marriage (in accordance with her community's rules) and lets it float away in the lake. She proudly sports her buzz-cut for the rest of the show.
- In the final episode, Yanky cuts his own sidelocks to try and prove to Esty that he loves her. She tries to convince him not to, since she knows she doesn't want to be with him.
- In-Series Nickname: Esther goes by "Esty." Her husband Yakov goes by "Yanky".
- It's All My Fault: Unlike the rest of the community, who blames Esty for wanting to leave her oppressive and sexist community, Yanky immediately blames himself for her departure. This serves to establish him as a genuinely Nice Guy who never meant to cause Esty any suffering.
- Jewish Mother: Yanky's mom, who goes so far as to check up with Esther on how their sex life is going to make sure Esty is fulfilling her duties to her son.
- Law of Inverse Fertility: Played with. Esty is under significant pressure to become pregnant quickly. Initially, viewers are given the impression that Esty and Yanky are struggling with infertility, but they later learn that the couple is actually having difficulty completing sexual intercourse itself.
- Then, when they have sex exactly one time, that's all it takes for Esty to get pregnant.
- Left Hanging: The show ends before we learn if Esty gets the scholarship, and with Moishe threatening to contest her custody of her unborn child.
- Life/Death Juxtaposition: After Esty's grandmother's death, her body is shown in a montage juxtaposed with her daughter and granddaughter sleeping peacefully.
- Mama Bear: Esty's mother faces off against the thuggish Moishe and threatens him with his own gun when he's about to ruin Esty's audition.Leah: This is not your world, and you cannot threaten me here.
- Missing Mom: Esty's mother abandoned her and moved to Berlin when Esty was a toddler. Except she didn't abandon her—that was a lie Esty's relatives told her. Esty's mother lost her in a court battle and was forced to flee to Berlin without her. Notably, though, her mother still chose separation from the Orthodox community over staying with Esty.
- Nice Jewish Boy: Yanky is more or less played sympathetically as a well-meaning Nice Guy, if unempathetic toward his wife's situation.
- Not Like Other Girls: Esty warns Yanky that she is this when meeting him to decide whether they want to be married. It's played sympathetically, since she's been taught that any reluctance to fulfill her duty as a homemaker and Baby Factory is deviant and completely unique to her.
- Orphan's Plot Trinket: Esty may not be quite an orphan, but the German citizenship papers left to her by her mother prove essential to her escape.
- The Outside World: Berlin, as contrasted with Esty's Williamsburg.
- Parental Neglect: Esty's father is an alcoholic who can barely function, and her mother abandoned her and ran away to Berlin. Later, though, she finds out the situation is more complex than she realized. She lives with her aunt and grandmother.
- Psycho Lesbian: Esty's family characterizes her mother as one, as she lives a nonreligious life in Berlin with a non-Jewish female partner.
- The Reveal: We don't find out just how young Esther really is (19) until she's asked during her audition at the very end.
- Sleeping Single: Esty and her husband sleep in separate beds, and only share one bed during their attempts to copulate.
- Symbolic Baptism: At the lake with her new acquaintances, Esty nervously takes off some of her clothing before wading slowly into the water, where she also removes her wig and lets it float away, to symbolize her rebirth as her real self.
- Sympathetic Adulterer: Esty is technically cheating on Yanky when she sleeps with Robert, but their married life is so difficult and misery-enducing for Esty that she is still viewed as sympathetic in spite of it.
- Traumatic Haircut:
- As a new bride, Esty's head is shaven. She finds the experience traumatizing, and cries throughout. Later inverted, as her barely grown-out hair happily passes for a trendy buzzcut in artsy Berlin.
- Yanky gives himself one in the last episode, in an attempt to prove he loves Esty, even though she begs him not to. They're both in tears by the end of it.
