When Rose escapes to Paris I fell in love with her. In Season 1 she’s a respectable and predictable mother, wife, and grandmother. Midge and Joel caretake their own children less than she does. The two kids sleep over in her apartment while the couple goes out club hopping as if they’re single. Rose is solid and stylish. Her almost invisibility sets up her Season 2 renewal, which is really fresh writing. She comes back from France and begins auditing classes at Columbia.
My God, I genuinely can’t remember what Rose does after that. She visits her family in Oklahoma! That’s weird. They come from oil money, and Rose wants to increase her allowance now that Abe quit his job and lost their apartment. Instead, she resents her brothers’ misogyny and refuses any money. Meanwhile, Abe has let beatniks overrun their home for the time they have left.
Then she and Abe move in with Joel’s parents. (The Maisels are fabulously written and played. So sharp!) Do they suffer there through all of Season 3? I think so. Then in Season 4 they move in with Midge back at their original apartment building.
I mean, honestly, what is that? So much character promise for Abe (which I discussed on his page) and Rose vanishes. Where is that plucky woman who survived a mid-life crisis? Where is that curious person who found a reinvigorated relationship with her husband? Oh, that’s right! She starts a career as a marriage broker! She has a intuitive instinct for matching people, so she’s encouraged to go professional with it. And they need an income, because Abe is still pretending to be an irresponsible teen.
Alright, enough of my complaining. What is Rose? She connects with people. That’s why she’s good at matchmaking. It’s more than observation, as a Five would excel at. She has a natural gift, a way of understanding others. I want to say Heart Type. She’s no Three. The way her family walks over her is something a Three would never support. Two or Four? She’s too undramatic for a Four. I guess that makes her a Two.
Her role as the perfect homemaker fits that. Her sudden fling to Paris is a fun Two slide to the strength number, Four. It’s selfish, and it can’t last, but it’s a wonderful free time. And then her personality is subsumed under Abe’s crazy breakdown. That’s also Two, to not complain when your family is taking advantage. It’s all there, and it’s a solid Enneagram, but . . . sigh, I think Rose could’ve had so much more.