Rachel Bloom on the Double Standards of Being a ‘Lady Boss’
‘How much boob is too much boob?’


Restless waiting for Crazy Ex-Girlfriend to return? Eager to see what mishegas Rachel Bloom’s character, the blundering, well-intentioned but often misguided Jewy feminist Rebecca Bunch has in store for us in Season 3? Me too. Have no fear, fellow fans: Bloom has released a new parody music video to tide us over. Produced by Vanity Fair, “Lady Boss” is right in Rebecca Bunch’s wheelhouse: It’s about navigating the challenges confronted by women in positions of authority.
Bloom’s wardrobe in the video’s opening shot—a bright blue pantsuit—channels Hillary Clinton, which is fitting for a video about the ridiculous, misogynistic standards that visible women in positions of power are subject to. “How much boob is too much boob?” wonders the large-busted Bloom in the music video, recalling a recurring trope in Crazy Ex-Girlfriend that came to a zenith with the song “Heavy Boobs.”
The video, like so many of the Crazy Ex-Girlfriend songs, is incisive in its use of biting, candid, and sometimes painfully self-aware humor to satirize social norms. “This is an anthem,” promises Bloom, but what makes the song so smart is that it is not just a hackneyed manifesto of second-wave feminism. Bloom confronts not just the double standards and unfair expectations that plague high-powered women in the workplace, but the stress she brings upon herself by constantly making sure she doesn’t cave to those expectations. She has a pillow emblazoned with the face of everyone’s favorite Jewish feminist icon, the Notorious RBG, but she sometimes cries into it. “I want you to do what I want but let me say it in a nice way. Oh right, I shouldn’t care if you think I’m nice,” she sings. Such is the double-edged sword of being a self-aware feminist in the world today.
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Miranda Cooper is an editorial intern at Tablet. Follow her on Twitter here.