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The Four ‘Sons’ as Characters From ‘Glee’
Contributed by Benjy Maor

  • TOP HAGGADAHS FOR 2023

As it happens, the four Jewish characters in McKinley High School’s glee club map quite neatly onto the four children of the Passover Seder, and the way each of them performs his or her Jewishness shines a different light on American Jewish identity, and on the themes of the Passover holiday.

 

Rachel Berry (Lea Michele) is the “Wise Child” — to a fault. She endlessly touts her Jewishness in one way or another, from Barbra Streisand songs to protests at Christmastime. She is also an irritating control freak, just like the unctuous Wise Child, who asks annoying, detailed questions about the statutes, laws and ordinances that God has commanded. The Haggadah obviously wants us to praise this kid, but most years I just want to slap him. Just like Rachel, he’s a know-it-all and a drama queen. “Look at me!” the Wise Child brags, just as Rachel does. Look how smart and good I am! Like Rachel in her goody-two-shoes sweaters, the Wise Child is intolerable. Rachel is a quintessential Jewish stereotype — smart, Semitic-looking, Magen-David-wearing — and yet she performs her Jewishness in the same way she performs her many solos on the show: in your face, turned up to 11. The Wise Child is the same way.

Noah “Puck” Puckerman (Mark Salling) is the “Wicked Child.” His is the most original of the Jewishnesses on “Glee,” contradicting every stereotype that Rachel serves to uphold. ... He’s a big, strong kid who doesn’t act or “look Jewish” in stereotypical ways. Often this is played for laughs, since his character is so un-stereotypically Jewish that his high level of pride and Jewish knowledge seems out of place.

Artie Abrams (Kevin McHale) is the “Simple Child.” He’s not unintelligent, but in terms of Jewishness, his is the simplest and the least interesting. Obviously, Artie is Jewish: Not just his name, but his brown-haired-white-guy-with-dorky-glasses nerd look marks him as stereotypically Jewish in every way Puck is not. Yet unlike Puck and Rachel, Artie hasn’t  performed  his Jewishness in any way whatsoever. There’s nothing to Artie’s Jewishness; it’s just there. Like the simple son, he shows up at the Seder but does little more.

Finally, Tina Cohen-Chang (Jenna Ushkowitz) is the “Child Who Does Not Know There’s a Question To Ask.” Like Artie, Tina is no dummy — but her Jewishness is completely invisible save for that double-barrel, presumably interfaith name. Because she is Asian, and because her Chinese heritage is central to her identity (she is now dating Mike Chang, the “other Asian,” and they commiserate about their ethnicity often), her Jewishness has effectively vanished. As with Artie, it’s not mentioned. The priestly name is there, but that’s as far as it goes.

Read more: http://forward.com/articles/136960/the-four-sons-as-characters-from-glee/#ixzz2OMDa03bh

 
haggadah Section: Cover
Source: By Jay Michaelson from the Jewish Daily Forward

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