‘Nobody Wants This’ and the new agelessness of man

Stay informed with free updates

Nobody Wants This premiered on Netflix on September 26, and became the most watched show in the English language within its first week. A tidy 10-episode, Los Angeles-set romance, it tells a time-old tale of boy meets girl, where the boy is Noah (played by Adam Brody), a Reform rabbi, newly single following the break-up of a long-term relationship that didn’t lead to an engagement, and the girl is Joanne (played by Kristen Bell), a scrappy single podcaster and “shiksa” so unfamiliar with Judaism that she’s never heard the word “shalom” out loud.

The two share a sizzling chemistry, which is to be expected from two stalwarts of the television schedules. Bell (the voice of Gossip Girl and star of The Good Place) is a tiny, effervescent blonde with that strange blend of self-confidence and “crazy” that reads as California charming. He’s outrageously delicious, as would be expected from the actor who first won the hearts of millions as The OC’s favourite surf nerd, Seth Cohen. Bell, who was attached to the project from the outset, reportedly brought on Brody, a former co-star who is known to be cautious about being typecast as irresistibly handsome nice guys. Too bad, Brody: with Nobody Wants This he has reignited the OC fan base and beguiled a whole new generation.

Fleabag gave us the Hot Priest. Now Brody brings Hot Rabbi. In a world of acceptance where all barriers to love have been eroded, true faith is now the only obstacle to the fulfilment of any budding romcom. To misquote Notting Hill: “She’s just a goy, standing in front of a rabbi, asking him to love her.”

If Nobody Wants This has succeeded it is presumably because it is fun and cute, and unexpectedly well written. The writer Erin Foster, a spit for Bell, also hosts a podcast with her sister and converted to Judaism before marriage. NWT is largely drawn from her own experiences. I binge-watched the whole thing in two evenings and found it very compelling. But while the story retreads the formula of many standard romcoms, I found it most fascinating for the curious agelessness of its milieu and all its principal characters. Brody is now 44, and Bell likewise is in her mid-forties. Assuming both are playing people roughly in the same age bracket, NWT mirrors the worldview of the geriatric millennial. But none of the characters seem encumbered by the baggage of real adult responsibility. None seem to have much in the way of previous relationships, first wives, stepkids, mortgages or real jobs. Instead, they live in well-appointed villas in one of the wealthiest cities in the world, doing non-specific work and spending an inconceivable length of time hanging out with their respective parents.

With the exception of Noah, who has to do rabbi work at what seems a sensationally liberal-minded temple (see the lively Reddit discussion board about whether he should be playing basketball on Shabbat), the other characters inhabit a world in which 90 per cent of one’s daily duties can be conducted from a deep 12-foot sofa. Marriage is depicted as something undertaken to satisfy religious expectation, and all the married couples live completely independent lives. Even parenting seems only to require the odd evening heartbreak consult.

I enjoyed NWT but I found its universe of kidulthood increasingly bewildering. Is this the result of algorithmic programming, in which the shows are neutered of any age nuance in order to appeal to a broader demographic? Or is this a reflection of a new world order in which wrinkles, offices and children are slowly being obliterated? Scrutinising Bell’s implacable forehead (the mask of modern Hollywood), I marvelled that her concerns about the future of their relationship didn’t raise the question of having babies. Instead, she worried about odd inanities such as “will you like my friends?”, who were similarly single, unencumbered and constantly available.

Typically, dramas about couples in their mid-thirties onwards have revolved around family life or the time bomb of fertility. But perhaps with modern medicine, and societal shifts, retaining friendships has indeed become the most pressing relationship dilemma. Birth rates in the world’s richest economies have more than halved since 1960, with fertility rates now well below the “replacement level” of 2.1 children per woman. Moreover, it’s not because they can’t that most people aren’t having children, it’s because they actually don’t want them.

Perhaps we are culturally transitioning into the world of the elder millennial — one that resembles the exact same world one lived in in one’s twenties, except now with salt-and-pepper hair and better furniture. Dating has become transactional, an app-based sex exchange, which means that actual relationships are a charming novelty. And while you may not live with your parents, you’re still so involved that your key relationships are primarily familial.

Or maybe this is the world according to Netflix. And like lovely Noah, it’s all a gorgeous fantasy.

Email Jo at [email protected]

Find out about our latest stories first — follow FTWeekend on Instagram and X, and subscribe to our podcast Life and Art wherever you listen

#agelessness #man