Matzo Fever

"I want a steamy little Jewish Princess!"
—Frank Zappa, one of very few SFW lines from his song "Jewish Princess".

Some dig Asians. Some prefer their lovers Latin. And some feel that Everyone Looks Sexier If French. And then there are those who find that when God chooses a people, he pulls out all the hotness stops.

Sort of a sub-trope of Everyone Looks Sexier If French, dedicated to the Chosen People. Maybe it's the Woobie factor (they are pretty much the world's Butt Monkeys); maybe it's their sense of humor (everybody knows Jews are funny). Maybe it's the strength of the Badass Israeli, or just the sweetness of the Nice Jewish Boy. Or even the allure of sophisticated Jewish culture. The Gentile may end up Converting for Love.

While primarily an American trope this can be seen in other countries with large Jewish populations, such as France. On the other hand it's an unknown trope in countries with negligible Jewish populations.

Obviously, compare and contrast Asian Gal with White Guy, Latin Lover, Where Da White Women At? and, well, any other ethnic or national tropes. Contrast Shiksa Goddess, and compare and contrast Jewish and Nerdy.

It's just a shame those beautiful Jewish girls have to become Jewish Mothers.

No real life examples, please; we'd be here all day. Real Life examples can go here.

Examples of Matzo Fever include:

Comic Books

  • Captain America used to be engaged to a nice girl named Bernie Rosenthal.
  • X-Men: Colossus and Kitty Pryde have had an on-and-off relationship over the years.
  • In the half book/half comic Limekiller At Large, the second item on Marty's bucket list is "Make love to a Jewish Woman (Long Story)"

Film

  • Inglourious Basterds: Shosanna Dreyfus; French and Jewish. She attracts the attentions of a Nazi and has a black boyfriend who is presumably not Jewish. Actress Melanie Laurent is herself an authentic French Jew.
  • In the David Mamet film State And Main, Sarah Jessica Parker's character mentions that she loves Jewish men while seducing Philip Seymour Hoffman's character. Tying into the trope title, she comes to believe he's Jewish after finding Matzo in his hotel room, which was just a gift from the director. In fact, he is not Jewish.
  • In Miller's Crossing, two Irish-American gangsters get into a love triangle with a Jewish woman.
  • The Brothers McMullen: Patrick has a rather Anvilicious relationship with a Jewish girl.
  • In Goodfellas, Henry Hill is an Irish-Italian gangster married to a Jewish wife while, apparently, raising his kids Jewish, too.
  • The Fearless Vampire Killers: Alfred falls instantly in love with the beautiful Sarah. Ironically, Alfred is played by the very Jewish Roman Polanski, while Sarah is played by Texas bombshell Sharon Tate. The couple hooked up in real life.
  • The Illusionist: This is a strong part of the subtext. The protagonist Eisenheim, a.k.a. Eduard Abramovich, is only Ambiguously Jewish (but not very ambiguously), but it's hard to escape the conclusion that the Crown Prince isn't the only reason he and Duchess Sophie von Teschen have to move to America to be together.
  • Leah in A Stranger Among Us. If she wasn't Hasidic, she would have trouble keeping track of all her boyfriends. As it is who ever the matchmaker picks for her is in luck.
  • In Mr. and Mrs. Smith, Mrs. Smith (played by Angelina Jolie and therefore awesomely hot) tells her husband, once she's finally started being honest with him, "I'm Jewish."
  • Exodus : Agent Ben Canaan can win the heart of a girl just by making endless speeches of Zionist ideology.
  • In Tales from the Crypt Presents: Bordello of Blood, Katherine Verdoux gets a serious case of this for Rafe Guttman. What's amazing is that, for such an exploitative, T&A, B-movie schlockfest of a film, there's actually a really interesting subplot going on about the tensions and conflicts of an interconfessional romance.
  • In Where the Truth Lies, Vince has a serious case of this for Lanny. It's not clear whether the reason Lanny rejects him is because he just has no homosexual inclinations whatsoever, or just because he's worried about what would happen to their careers if this became public knowledge.
  • In Meeting Daddy, a proper Southern belle mistakes her best friend's future husband for a Jew (because he's from New York and was raised in Los Angeles) and tells him, "I want to suck your big, circumcised Jewish dick." (He's actually Episcopalian.)

Literature

  • In Trainspotting, Spud says his plans for his cut of the money are to settle down with a beautiful Jewish princess.
  • Rebecca in Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott makes it Older Than Radio. Rebecca seems to go for Ivanhoe, but he's only got eyes for his gentile maiden Rowena. Rebecca/Ivanhoe is generally the Fan-Preferred Couple. Walter Scott was quite aware of the fans' feeling toward the Rebecca/Ivanhoe pairing, to the point that her felt it necessary to explain just why Ivanhoe and Rebecca could not possibly have married. It was also rumored that the character Rebecca was based off of real life Jewish beauty Rebecca Gratz.
  • The novel Eighty-Sixed includes the slang for gays with ethnic fetishes: "beanie queens" are those who like Orthodox Jews.[1]
  • Miriam from The Roman Mysteries can stop men in their tracks and cause accidents by her mere presence.
  • Lawrence Block's spy story The Cancelled Czech, with a girl who has been raised as a devout neo-Nazi ... and has intense sexual fantasies about Jewish men.

Live-Action TV

  • Mad Men seems to love this concept, made especially relevant by showing that Jews are outsiders in the ad men's WASPy social circles. Don Draper's first and second-season mistresses are Jewish, as is his fourth season girlfriend. Roger's young wife is also Jewish. When Draper's firm lobbies for a job with the Israeli tourism bureau, and the executives take particular note of how beautiful Israeli women are.
  • NCIS: Ziva David, the Israeli agent. Ignore the fact that she's portrayed by a Catholic Chilean.
  • Eliot Spencer in Leverage seems to get a mild case of it toward Raquel Dayan, his counterpart in the rival crew in "The Two Live Crew Job."
  • Fran Fine in The Nanny is very, very Jewish, and attracts the attention of dozens of men over the years, including many celebrities and (of course) her boss the Broadway producer Mr. Sheffield.
  • Glee: Puck and Rachel date for no reason other then that they are both Jewish in a very obvious parody of the Token Minority Couple. Rachel also has a Stalker with a Crush in the form of Jacob Ben Israel (yeah, guess what religion he is).
  • The X-Files: Fox Mulder of is of Jewish descent (according to his actor, himself part-Jewish). Guess after whose fandom the Estrogen Brigade trope was named.
  • In an episode of Law and Order SVU, a serial rapist mentioned he's really, really into Jewish women, to the point of secretly corresponding with some while in his prison's equivalent of the Aryan Brotherhood.
  • Northern Exposure milked the Belligerent Sexual Tension between Maggie O'Connell and the show's Jewish protagonist Joel Fleischmann for several seasons before finally giving them their Slap Slap Kiss.
  • In Band of Brothers, Liebgott is noted for being the only Jew in Easy Company (which at first leads to conflict with Guarnere when he takes offense at his scornfully referring to Sobel as "a son of Abraham." They're all friends later, though). He later tells Webster all about his plans for after the war to marry "a nice Jewish girl, with great, big, soft titties and a smile to die for," complete with hilarious gestures.
  • Played for Laughs of course in Childrens Hospital. Doctor Glenn Richie and his rival Rabbi Jewy Mc Jew Jew are beyond plain-looking, but catch quite a bit of lust from ladies at the Hospital. Their Jewishness acts as a massive turn-on, thus Hilarity Ensues.
  • Lisa Cuddy from House MD.
  • Coupling: "The Girl With Two Breasts" is a sexy Israeli.
  • One episode of The Big Bang Theory had Christy (a super-slutty friend of Penny's) becoming delighted at the discovery that her new beau is named "Howard Walowitz." "My first Jew!" she squeals. (Funny, we weren't aware she was collecting them.)
  • Obviously part of the Backstory—and the ongoing situation—of the 1970s Sitcom Bridget Loves Bernie.
  • In an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, Larry has a fling with an anti-semitic Muslim woman who enjoys the degredation she feels when having sex with Jews.
  • Lisa from Saved by the Bell was originally written as a Jewish princess so Screech's affection for her would have been this. She was rewritten when Lark Voorhees was cast.
  • Elliott in Scrubs has an Imagine Spot where she builds herself the perfect husband and he turns out to be Jewish. She then mentions that her parents wouldn't approve.
  • London from The Suite Life confesses to being Jewish in the episode "Cooking With Romeo & Juliet" so the vast amount of love interests she has in the series have both Matzo Fever and Yellow Fever.

Music

  • Frank Zappa's song "Jewish Princess" is a bit over the top, but a lot of things he lists in that song, crude though they may be, are definitely sexy.

Religion and Mythology

  • Esther in The Bible was chosen to be the Great King's Hot Consort and was the Persian Empire's most beautiful woman. At least the King thought so. And some other Jewish people in the Bible are described as beautiful as well.
  • King Solomon. Consider this: King David, the man after whom the city of Jerusalem is named, had 4 wives. Solomon had seven hundred wives, and four hundred concubines. He was the Bible's ultimate Ladies' Man.

Professional Wrestling

Theater

  • In Me and My Dick, the hottest girl in school is described as a "cute little Jewish girl".
  • Jewtopia!: One of the main characters of the play wants a Jewish girl so he doesn't have to make another decision in his life. He marries someone posing as a Jew, but she converts at the very end of the play.
  • The Merchant of Venice: Jessica, might be the oldest example of this in popular western literature. Jessica is the beautiful daughter of Shylock, and she runs away with Lorenzo, the Gentile nobleman in love with her.
  • The Jew of Malta: Barabbas' daughter Abigail in Christopher Marlowe's Elizabethan era play is also a probable Ur Example.
  • Abies Irish Rose, a play from 1922 about a Jewish man who marries an Irish Catholic girl, and provided inspiration for Bridget Loves Bernie and the comedy of Stiller and Meara.

Web Original

Western Animation

  • In The Simpsons episode with Dustin Hoffman as Mr. Bergstrom, one of the things Lisa lists that make her trust him is his "Semitic good looks".
  • American Dad episode "Bar Mitzvah Shuffle": Etan Cohen, a sophisticated Jewish boy, seduces Steve's girlfriend, Debbie. Being Jewish is part of the charm, and Etan plays it for all it's worth.
    • In "Stan's Food Restaurant", Steve wants to get with a crazy girl who believes her doll is alive. She mentions the doll "likes Hebrews" when Steve arranges a "date" between it and Snot..
  • In Family Guy when Peter found out Lois was Jewish he was really into it, at least until his Catholic guilt kicked in.
  1. ↑ "Bean queens" are those who like Latinos, while "rice queens" are those who like Asians. The "beanie" is partly a joking reference to "bean queens," but mostly a reference to yarmulkes.
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