Crazy Ex-Girlfriend has been and creating complex and nuanced characters and situations since Season 1. And with multiple awards under its belt, this has not gone unnoticed.
Glamour reports that creators Rachel Bloom (who plays Rebecca) and Aline Brosh McKenna are now opening up about how the show will continue to fight stereotypes in season 2. Particularly, they want to play with the “Fatal Attraction” stereotype. By this, they mean the idea that in many shows and movies, women who are obsessed with romantic partners often end up “going crazy”, or even in prison, or dead.
I mean, there’s no denying Rebecca has these obsessive and destructive tendencies. That’s kind of the point of the show. But it’s the way that the creators depict it that makes it so unique. Aline Brosh McKenna explains,
“When someone becomes romantically obsessed and it’s a woman, we have a tendency to stereotype her in a certain way. Everyone has made one too many phone calls or sent one too many texts or driven by an apartment one too many times. We all have that in us; Rebecca just has more of that. [And unfortunately our] culture in general tends to dismiss and mock such behavior.”
Rachel Bloom adds,
“Right. They’re the monster. It’s the reason the show is not called My Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. If the show was called My, it would be just like Fatal Attraction or any other movie where the obsessed woman is the ‘other,’ right? The show is from Rebecca’s point of view, and so understanding why she is obsessed the way she is without taking the pathology out of it.”
The creators and writers are looking to depict people like Rebecca in a healthier, more sympathetic way. Because we’ve all been there to some extent. Brosh McKenna explains,
“If you look at Fatal Attraction or Swim Fan or Unforgettable with Katherine Heigl, they usually end up dead. It’s like the power of a woman’s infatuation is so powerful that the only thing we can think of to do with her is kill her. So this season we really wanted to explore what it feels like to be her, because my feeling is we all have sort of been her.”
The two explain that they try their best to depict why Rebecca does what she does, and to build up empathy towards her. It makes her more relatable and likable, and makes her actions more understandable.
Rachel also explains that her character isn’t the only flawed one. They all are. Just like any other person. But in showing why they act the way they do, or how they came about a certain decision, we can better understand and relate to them.
The show already does a great job in playing with expectations, and cleverly playing with stereotypes in ways that really makes the audience think about their own ways of viewing others, the world, and themselves. We can’t wait to see how this continues to unfold in Season 2.
