On Surrogacy and Mothering: Reviewing “A Body that Works”
A Body that Works, the English title of a popular Israeli series, captures the complexity of a system where one body bears a child for another to rear. And while season 1 of the Netflix series sometimes veers into soap opera territory, it admirably depicts the messy relationships and emotions that emerge from infertility, miscarriage, and surrogacy. Shira Hadad, one of the series’ creators, has a son through surrogacy, though her personal journey was “much less dramatic” than the story told in A Body that Works.
In Israel and elsewhere, the command to be fruitful and multiply is a religious doctrine to some and a demographic imperative for others. It makes infertility a personal, societal, and marital tragedy and surrogacy a gift. But surrogacy is also an economic arrangement, one that potentially exploits vulnerable women. The show addresses all of this.
Elie (Rotem Sela) is a powerhouse editor who is brutally honest with her authors. She demands much of them as she does of herself. However, in the area of fertility, she has a body that doesn’t work. After numerous grievous miscarriages, IVF seems to take, and she and her husband Ido (Yehuda Levi) are ecstatic. But then she awakens once more to a pool of blood on her sheet, and she must face the fact that they can either adopt or go the route of surrogacy, a process that is state-regulated in Israel.
Once approved, they and their prospective surrogate, Chen (Gal Malka), meet. On one level, this seems a very good match: Chen is a single mother who needs money to prove that she can provide a good home for her son, Uri, the love of her life. Watching Chen’s employment struggles reminds us that a one-dimensional critique of surrogacy as exploitative neatly sidesteps the exploitation inherent in much of the labor market under late capitalism. Uri’s father, who is newly economically solvent and who poses a custody threat, makes Chen’s economic investment in becoming Elie and Ido’s surrogate that much greater. And reproductively, her body has always worked well, which gives her confidence that the implantation of Elie’s fertilized egg will take.
However, after Chen indeed becomes pregnant, the mismatch between her and Elie dominates. Elie is desperate for this pregnancy to succeed, and she becomes a control freak on prenatal vitamins as well as what Chen does and eats. By providing for Chen and being hyper-involved with the pregnancy, she hopes to feel that she, too, is expecting (the pathos of her position during a mother-to-be gathering that she attends is excruciating to watch). Understandably, Chen experiences Elie’s hovering as condescension and privilege. The tension between them grows, and Ido becomes a mediator. But then he becomes more than a mediator, as Chen turns to him for emotional support, especially after the pregnancy is imperiled.
Ido is a complex character who strives to protect Elie from the rancor his parents feel toward his infertile wife and the professional fallout he experiences in order to pay for the surrogacy. Similarly, he strives to protect Chen from Elie’s dogmatism on all things pregnancy-related. However, he, too, has grieved the multiple miscarriages, and when the fetus is at risk during a long labor, he is more concerned about “his” child than Chen’s body or life.
The Israeli title of the series is Guf Shlishi, Third Person, and Chen certainly plays this role. But another third person is Tomer (Lior Raz), the author Elie has been helping to birth his book. Elie, feeling shut out of Chen’s pregnancy and increasingly at odds with Ido, overinvests herself in Tomer’s act of creation and begins an affair with him. However, that relationship goes seriously awry when at an awards dinner, Tomer honors his mother rather than Elie as the progenitor of the book.
Once the metaphorical connection between mothering and editing is torn asunder, Elie is once again left feeling alone, unloved, and unlovable. Raised in the children’s wing of a kibbutz and thus not under the constant care of her birth mother, she fears that she has been rendered emotionally unfit to be a mother, even as she yearns to be one.
Yet, Elie’s editorial attention to detail shows Chen—and viewers—that her capacity for caring has been underestimated. Chen is moved when Elie remembers Uri’s birthday after just a passing mention of the date. Ultimately, she chooses Elie rather than Ido to be her coach and advocate in the delivery room. Despite her worry, Elie respects Chen’s wishes to hold off on a caesarean.
After giving birth, Chen awakens to find the baby gone with Elie and Ido. However, she also finds a piece of peeled fruit by her bedside. While in labor, she shared with Elie that her own mother, who died when Chen was quite young, used to leave her a gift of peeled fruit. Chen has given Elie a son, and Elie now seeks to nurture rather than control or resent Chen. Given the evolution of their relationship, it seems fitting that Sela and Malka both received Best Actress awards at the 2023 Series Mania international festival.
Ultimately, A Body that Works is a compelling watch, even though viewers will occasionally shake their heads as the plot predictably thickens.
Helene Meyers is the author of Movie-Made Jews: An American Tradition.
