Shira Haas gets Golden Globe nod for Unorthodox role

Shira Haas has become the first Israeli actress to be nominated for a Golden Globe for her role in hit series Unorthodox, about leaving Chasidic life.

The four-part show, based on Deborah Feldman’s 2012 memoir, got the nod for Best Limited Series, with Haas nominated for Best Actress in a limited series, anthology series or motion picture made for television.

With the awards ceremony at the end of the month, she is up against Cate Blanchett for Mrs America, Anya Taylor-Joy for The Queen’s Gambit, Nicole Kidman for The Undoing and Daisy Edgar-Jones for Normal People.

Haas, 25, stars as Esther Shapiro, a young strictly-Orthodox woman from
Williamsburg, Brooklyn, who leaves the community for a life in Berlin.

Despite an upbringing in a secular Jewish family, Haas also played a strictly-Orthodox character in Shtisel – her break-out role.

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Feldman was born into Brooklyn’s famously insular Satmar sect, spoke mainly Yiddish and – aged 17 – was engaged to a virtual stranger. She was told what to wear, what to read and to whom to speak.

Denied sex education, she was trapped in a sexually and emotionally dysfunctional marriage, the failure to get pregnant dominating her life. Once she was, she realised that she wanted something more for her child and planned her escape.

Responding to her nomination, Haas said: “I’m very, very excited. I wanted to say thank you to all the supporters and fans. I’m still taking it in.”

Also nominated by the Golden Globes was Sacha Baron-Cohen for lead actor in his Borat Subsequent Moviefilm and supporting actor in Trial of the Chicago 7, where he played activist Abbie Hoffman alongside Mark Rylance.

Borat Subsequent Moviefilm was nominated in the category of Best Motion
Picture, Musical or Comedy. The ceremony will be broadcast by NBC on 28 February.