“Fans and viewers will be very surprised by some of the twists and turns the season takes for all the characters.”
Midge Maisel is figuring things out.
No, you haven’t accidentally clicked on an article from 2017. The main character of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel is still finding her way in season 4, which drops today on Amazon Prime Video. While it seemed the NYC stand-up dynamo finally found her footing on the comedy stage in season 3, we saw how poorly that turned out. And season 4 picks up right where things left off: After getting fired as the opener on Shy Baldwin’s tour, we see Midge falling apart, one tightly fastened article of clothing at a time.
But the literal and figurative about-face feels in line with the time that’s passed since Midge was last on our screens, throughout the Coney Island Cyclone-style roller coaster the pandemic has us strapped into.
“For so many of us, these last two-plus years have been filled with a lot of personal reevaluation, where I think people are considering what their priorities are and who they want to be in either their worlds or the world at large. That’s something Midge is doing in a huge way this season” says Rachel Brosnahan, who plays Midge. “She spent the first season discovering a new talent, the second figuring out how it impacted people around her, and the third trying to turn it into a career. And she’ll spend the fourth facing the fact that any kind of career she could have imagined is evaporating, and realizing that there’s no roadmap for her or the kind of comic that she wants to be.” Brosnahan feels Midge is “figuring out how to be true to herself in this moment. I think that’s something a lot of people can relate to after these last two years.”
The show typically takes about a year-long break between seasons, but production on the fourth hadn’t yet begun when the third dropped in late 2019. Then came Covid-19.
“When people ask, ‘Was it difficult to slip back into Maisel after such a long break?’ my question to them is, Has it been easy for you to slip back into your jeans? Anything tight-fitting? It was very, very similar torture,” says Alex Borstein, who stars opposite Brosnahan as Midge’s manager Susie. “It was hard. Things didn’t fit anymore. You didn’t know if you wore them well. I looked at Rachel many times on set and was like, ‘Am I acting? I don’t know if I know how to act anymore.’ Nothing felt normal. It was a slow build. We had to get back into it, but there wasn’t a lot of time.” Brosnahan adds, “We lost the rhythm of the show when the world shut down and slowed down. And I think that was one of the most challenging things to get back.”
But the comedic rhythm is there, front and center, as it’s always been. You’ll hear it in the usual rhythm of the Amy Sherman-Palladino banter, but also see it in physical form. Early on, Midge’s anxious energy crescendos in a scene featuring Midge bumping into every piece of furniture in her newly re-configured bedroom, while in quick conversation with her best friend Imogene.
See, Midge is on a mission to start anew in the 1960s. Not only is she reimagining her career as a comic (whether she likes it or not), she’s also back in her old apartment. But she’s determined to make new memories and strip any remnants of her previous life out of her home’s bones. Hence that chaotically configured bedroom.
Luckily, she’s got some new clothes to go along with her reinvention.
“Midge’s wardrobe has continued to evolve,” says Brosnahan. “When we first met her, she had two distinctly different lives: her Upper West Side mother, housewife, picture-perfect life, and then the downtown beatnik scene she was dabbling in. And I think those worlds have begun to grow closer and intersect.” For people who watch the show primarily for its fashion, Brosnahan offered this tease: “We’re moving into the ’60s. And Midge has some new, fantastic performance dresses that audiences can look forward to, because she’s spending more time on stage.”
Believe it or not, her stubborn manager Susie’s also evolving. Sure, she’s gambled away her only client’s money — and now that only client is out of a well-paying gig. But she’s feeling an itch of ambition. Borstein says, “I have a lot of respect for her character in that she’s fearless and expanding. She has nothing, and yet she’s trying to build and build and build. She’s not scared of anything.” The actress, known previously for her sketch and voiceover work, feels Susie’s current career trajectory mirrors her own. ”Susie and I are little bulldogs and we’re fierce, but we also always feel like the underdog.”
Borstein noticed Susie’s evolution was well-timed with her own experience over the past two years. “Susie is now surrounding herself with more people — she doesn’t want to be solitary. She wants associates and she wants other clients. So coming out of a long period of alone time, she’s now looking to widen her circle.” Borstein points out, “I don’t know whether Amy intended this, but it seems very timely as we came out of a very isolated existence, everyone being cooped up and quarantined.”
Borstein thinks Susie’s self-reliance would help her in a time of crisis like, let’s say, a pandemic. “I think had Susie existed in a time of pandemic, in some ways it would’ve been like nothing had changed,” says Borstein. “She’s such a cockroach, I think she’ll survive nuclear war. Nothing can beat her down.” And for Susie, social distancing would have been a piece of cake: “She’s not a hugger. She doesn’t like being close to people. She doesn’t shake hands. I think she probably would’ve naturally steered clear.”
But Midge’s parents and her in-laws might not have had as easy a time. “The families would not handle COVID well, but in very different ways,” says Brosnahan. “I think [the Weissmans’ housekeeper] Zelda would probably have moved in with them. She would be keeping everybody on track. She would have copious masks and hand sanitizer in every room. Midge’s parents Abe and Rose would probably be completely oblivious to most things that were happening around them and confused by all the changing knowledge and regulations.” For Midge’s in-laws, “Moish and Shirley would’ve been like, ‘F*ck it. We’re going to Florida.’ And they’d go, with Shirley in her fur coat.” As for Midge, says Brosnahan, “She would have a lot of new material.”
Lucky for the characters, that isn’t their reality. The season does have its own emotional roller coasters though, literally (thanks to a trip to Coney Island that will give you shpilkes) and figuratively.
“I think people will both be surprised by the way she reacts and also not,” Brosnahan says of how Midge handles this season’s obstacles. “She’s furious and she’s desperate and feels like she’s been sort of unfairly thrown under a bus. I think simultaneously she’s understanding that she made a huge mistake, and whether or not it was intentional, it has big consequences. This will be a season of her grappling with both ideas at the same time. A part of her that is not gonna give up or take no for an answer, is now comfortable rebuilding and reevaluating. And also part of her wants to feel like she was wronged, and she has some revenge to seek for that.” She adds, “Fans and viewers will be very surprised by some of the twists and turns the season takes for all the characters.”
