There is a particular scene in Unorthodox which I think would be very hard for someone to forget even after finishing the four part miniseries as it is the most unforgettable one.
Esty was a 19 year old Hasidic Jew; she fled from her ultra-conservative community in Williamsburg with her husband and escaped to Berlin where she made friends with music students. Berlin, being a modern place, consisted of progressive and open-minded people so these students too weren’t so harsh.
However, Esty stood on the shallow shores of a lake with a t-shirt on and a jumper in her hands while still in flesh colored stockings. She was almost completely clothed, so she began to walk into the water. While walking, she realized she was still wearing a sheitel and before she knew it, she was taking off her wig. To Orthodox Jews, a sheitel signifies a woman’s faithfulness and is worn after marriage. Esty began to float on her back while chanting freedom and it all felt wrong to her. So, she did what anyone would do in her situation; she dove into the water. This can be compared to the liberation a newborn child feels after being set free from the stems of a religion into a different one.
The Netflix series is based on the autobiography of Deborah Feldman who married a Hasidic man, named Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots, published in 2012. At the age of 19, she fled a forced marriage while expecting her first child and moved to Germany from the Sathmar sect of Williamsburg.
Just as for Feldman Berlin, Esty’s new life filled with opportunities to start over is unbound freedom. It is astounding when compared that she is able to escape from her backgrounds and family shelter, make new friends, and even get an audition at a well known music school. These things single handedly showcase how crafty and ingenious Esty is especially when paired to the documents her grandparents gave her.
But just like in any good drama there are new consequences when adopted Yanky, Esty’s husband, and his thick bodied cousin reach and try to force her back into their community in New York. To make things worse it has also emerged that Esty might possibly be expecting Yanky’s child which brings new complications to the table.
Shifting the focus towards the other aspect of the story, I do agree that Esty’s coming of age is the most captivating part. Throughout the film, Esty needs to constantly try to answer the questions revolving around her community, what if she has to survive? Thankfully, the remarkable Israeli actress Shira Haas does a brilliant job portraying Esty. Haas can be seen as tinier than the other actors, and from the beginning the audience tends to get the vibe of wanting to protect her, but as the episodes unfold her having a spine of steel shines through.
In case you find enclosed religious cultures interesting, this offers glimpses into the Sathmar stricture. Most of the Unorthodox episodes set in Williamsburg have primary actors speaking in Yiddish. The scenes where Esty lives in Berlin sharply contrast with her rigid life in Williamsburg. The show portrays Berlin and Williamsburg as a kind of qualia: freedom versus restriction, hedonism versus conservatism, transience versus permanence. As Esty moves about Berlin, she visits coffee shops and clubs, indulging in the freedom and fresh air provided by the city’s big parks and other open areas, however, just like every other part of Germany, there are always reminders of the country’s Nazi history.
The more positive aspects of the clan: the community, the traditions and the belonging, which Unorthodox largely ignores, do not exist in the religious isolated society. For sure, there are many Hasidic Jews who derive strength and belonging from their faith and the community, although it may be for extremely restrictive. There is a tendency, however, among many to like Esty privilege the freedom of choice or expression over the loss of ‘self’ into a more complex, but perhaps more enjoyable, collective and spiritual way of life.
However, this is simultaneously the reason the narrative is really interesting. Esty tells her new friends in Berlin about saying: “God expected too much of me. Now I need to find my own path”.
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