The dictionary definition of trauma is:
Severe emotional shock and pain,
caused by an extremely upsetting experience.
There is no set way to process trauma.
But, in "Unorthodox," we see how two different communities,
one in Berlin, and another in Brooklyn,
cope with the tragedies that have shaped them.
And, in turn, we learn ways to deal with our trauma.
In Brooklyn, trauma forms 19 year old Esty's,
and her community's, identity.
The action follows the secretive Satmar community
of Hasidic Jews.
Established by a rabbi who had fled Satu Mare,
in present-day Romania, during the Holocaust.
The Satmar community does not mix with others.
In "Unorthodox,"
at the head of the sex-segregated table,
for Pesach dinner,
an annual commemoration of the Jews who escaped slavery
in ancient Egypt,
Esty's grandfather gives his reasons why.
[Grandfather] We tell ourselves
the story of Passover
to remind us of our suffering.
[Narrator] The show celebrates
the strong bonds of family and tradition,
within Esty's community,
where religious customs and prayers
can take place safely,
while deadly attacks
on synagogues, and other venues frequented by Jews,
rise, across the world.
This community defies anti-Semitism, by living devoutly.
We also see, in this scene,
how Satmar Jews draw on past trauma,
to make members scared of the big, bad outside.
[Grandfather] When we trusted
our friends and neighbors,
God punished us.
When we forget who we are,
we invite God's wrath.
[Narrator] The Holocaust
caused PTSD in its survivors.
Its impact lives on.
As Auschwitz survivor, chemist, and writer,
Primo Levi puts it:
"Auschwitz is outside of us,
but it is all around us, in the air.
The plague has died away, but the infection still lingers,
and it would be foolish to deny it."
This generational trauma grows from the roots
of Esty's family tree, and shapes Esty's personal identity.
She is discouraged from exploring passions
that contradict the community's values.
Her piano lessons are so frowned upon,
she must take them in secret.
Her teacher, Vivian Dropkin,
is derided as 'a shiksa,' or non-Jew.
But interestingly, though the show never mentions it,
Dropkin is a secular Jew.
Despite her faith, her choices are not Jewish enough
for Esty's devout community.
Many Orthodox Jews believe that the way
to undo the trauma of the Holocaust,
is to repopulate.
2013 research for the Pew Center
shows that Orthodox Jews have a birth rate of 4.1,
as opposed to the U. S. national average of 1.8.
Esty totally believes what she's been taught to believe,
later insisting,
"We are rebuilding the six million lost."
Jews killed in the Holocaust.
[Grandmother] So many lost.
But, soon, you'll have children of your own.
[Narrator] Six million is no small sum.
So, alongside the housework needed to keep her home tidy,
and her husband, Yanky Shapiro,
well fed and in perfectly ironed suits,
Esty's job is to have as many children as possible.
[Woman] You will have no leverage in this marriage,
until there is a baby. Understand me?
[Narrator] She is told that sex will give her husband pleasure,
which, in turn, will give her exactly what she wants:
what she has been told she wants... a baby.
The problem with this way of dealing with trauma,
as we see it through Esty's eyes,
is, it creates a domino effect.
There is a field of academic study
called epigenetics,
which deals with the concept
of trans-generational trauma,
or, the idea that trauma can be inherited.
Some study suggests that DNA
changes in response to horrifying experiences,
and that, then, passes down generations.
Whether through epigenetics or not,
in "Unorthodox," traumatized parents
unintentionally traumatize their children.
Esty's grandparents are still, understandably,
bereft by the Holocaust.
Their son, Mordecai, is mentally unwell.
As for Leah, her trauma comes, mainly,
from not quite fitting the mold that's been set for her.
Esty is tarred by her parents' pain.
Now that she is a bride herself, she finds the rules troublesome.
[Mrs. Shapiro] We shouldn't have agreed to this marriage.
[Yanky Shapiro] Mommy, please!
[Mrs. Shapiro] The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.
[Narrator] When Esty tries to argue the case
for her to be pleasured, rather than traumatized in bed,
using scripture as evidence of God's will for it,
she is shut down.
[Yanky Shapiro] Women are not allowed to read the Talmud!
[Narrator] This text is for men only, not for women's eyes,
due to something known as
"Kavod Hatzibur," or the dignity of the community.
Esty's story shows how socially restrictive responses to trauma
often unfairly muzzle women.
Esty can't get away with half of what her cousin, Moishe, can.
Moishe is a thief, a liar, an aggressive lout,
with no consideration for others.
Yet, his behavior seems rooted In self-loathing.
His moral decay, his own trauma,
is catching up with him,
as he realizes, he has neither
the commitment of one community,
nor the tools of another.
[Moishe cackles laughing.]
[Narrator] Meanwhile, Yanky,
a saint next to Moishe,
ends up meting out trauma,
through his childishly ignorant commitment
to maintaining his community,
by any means available.
In Brooklyn, we see how trauma,
sadly, sometimes begets more trauma.
As Esty's mom puts it:
[Leah] So much damage done in Brooklyn,
in the name of God.
All the rules, all the gossip.
No wonder Esty can't stand it.
[Narrator] Berlin, meanwhile,
has a very different way of dealing with trauma.
[Classical music.]
"Unorthodox" presents
Adolf Hitler's former stronghold
as a liberal, diverse idyll,
where people, especially the young, can do
what they want, when they want, with whom they want.
Once the epicenter of suffering,
Berlin counters its past trauma
by celebrating joy,
and reclaiming some of its character
that the Nazis tried to extinguish.
This is the city
that once saw the Golden 1920s of the Weimar Republic,
when Marlene Dietrich rose to fame,
cabaret was popular entertainment,
and the Bauhaus art movement was founded.
This social liberalism comes across in public displays
of affection, that the naive and modest Esty is struck by.
She is used to a traumatic sex life,
that only ever happened in private,
yet was discussed so publicly.
In Berlin, the opposite is true.
This is because pleasure, rather than procreation,
is the goal.
Esty begins to realize
that the world is not as black and white
as she has been taught.
[Man] You could try to rescue Robert's attempt at a salad.
[Narrator] The city's physical spaces
are examples of how traumatic sites can be reclaimed.
On Esty's first excursion with her new friends,
she ventures upon what is,
to her community back in Brooklyn,
hell.
[Man] When the Berlin Wall was up,
East German guards shot anyone
who tried to swim across this lake to freedom.
[Esty] And now?
[Man] Now, you can swim as far as you like.
[Narrator] It might be the location of trauma,
but it's not the source of trauma.
Unlike the Mikvah that blessed Esty,
a secular body of water cannot bless, or condemn.
Only people can.
Of course, some people will never be able to find joy
in the same waters Hitler gazed across,
as he decided to end millions of Jews' lives.
But in this scene,
Esty has an opportunity to help
begin her new life, within its waters.
Esty removes her wig in this lake,
in a more extreme version of the breakup haircut.
While the shorn hair beneath it
is the imposition of a sect
that sees women's hair as so tempting to men
it must be shaved off,
it is also an uncanny and unintended reminder
of the ways in which Esty's ancestors
were dehumanized by the Nazis,
their heads shaved in the concentration camps.
[Esty panting.]
[Narrator] Without this wig, she can float in the water,
free to forget her trauma,
and all the rules and regulations that led to it.
The lake scene proves how
expression of individual freedoms
can pay tribute to past generations who were once restricted.
By swimming in the waters,
Esty and her friends
do what many from previous generations could not.
Joy is, for them, a far more useful
tool of remembrance, than guilt.
[Man] A lake is just a lake.
[Narrator] Esty's new friends
prove that trauma comes in many forms.