Erin Foster Defends How 'Nobody Wants This' Portrays Jewish Characters

Nobody Wants This creator Erin Foster is responding to critics who believe the Netflix series features stereotypical depictions of Jewish people.

“I think we need positive Jewish stories right now,” Foster, 42, told the Los Angeles Times in an interview published Monday, September 30. “I think it’s interesting when people focus on, ‘Oh, this is a stereotype of Jewish people,’ when you have a rabbi as the lead — a hot, cool, young rabbi who smokes weed. That’s the antithesis of how people view a Jewish rabbi, right?”

The 10-episode romantic comedy follows the love story of agnostic, outspoken sex podcaster Joanne (Kristen Bell) and unconventional rabbi Noah (Adam Brody). Despite the pair’s undeniable chemistry and attraction, all of their family members and friends disapprove of the pairing.

“If I made the Jewish parents, like, two granola hippies on a farm, then someone would write, ‘I’ve never met a Jewish person like that before,’” Foster continued. “‘You clearly don’t know how to write Jewish people, you don’t know what you’re doing, and that doesn’t represent us well.’”

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Foster herself converted to Judaism after marrying her husband, Simon Tikham, in 2019. She loosely based the series on her own life and relationship.

“This show is based on the only good decision I ever made: falling for a nice Jewish boy,” she told Netflix’s Tudum in September. “But I realized that being happy is way harder than being miserable — there’s nothing to complain about. So, I created this show based on all the ways that finding the right person can be so hard.”

In her latest interview, Foster also addressed the timing of the show during a moment of heightened antisemitism around the world. While she has a point of view on the subject matter, she believes it “shouldn’t be a part of the show.”

“I don’t think that it’s OK to speak for so many people,” she told the Los Angeles Times. “What I really wanted to do was shed a positive light on Jewish culture from my perspective — my positive experience being brought into Jewish culture, sprinkling in a little fun, [and] educational moments about things in Judaism that I love without it being heavy-handed. Because I don’t think people want that in the show.”

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Bell, 44, appreciated Foster’s candor and stories as she filmed Netflix’s latest hit series alongside Brody, also 44.

“Erin talked to us a lot about her experiences,” Bell recalled to Today.com. “She is such an open book and offered up all of her history of meeting and dating her husband, and her thought process about converting and about their differences and their similarities.”

Nobody Wants This is currently streaming on Netflix.