The New Pope Might Not Be Italian—But Netflix’s ‘Nonnas’ Sure Is
I have always made light of my own ethnic background.
With a super Polish last name and the two other common hyphenations that render me a Chicago-style sausage who didn’t stand a chance at escaping a Catholic upbringing (Irish and Italian-American), I’ve always had an ambiguous relationship with the word “culture”.
Formally, it was something to be acquired by reading or experienced in a museum. Informally, it was the thing that turned the shy Indian boys in my high school into a Bhangra boy-band for our talent shows, the thing I still secretly wish I had when I watch TikToks of Bad Bunny promoting his new album with a parranda at Toñitas. Something confident and contagious that I’ve always enjoyed watching from the outside.
Netflix’s Nonnas changed that for me.
As the most dominant slice of my American pie-chart, “Italian” culture was always something we ate or drank. It going to the deli and seeing all The Godfather movie posters and having my dad explain people’s mixed feelings about Hollywood, representation, and organized crime. It was everything my nonna made with her own two hands, and the strict standards my grandfather had for Italian restaurants (Olive Garden was not in the consideration set). It was listening to Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett and Andrea Bocelli around the dinner table.
No one in my family speaks Italian, so that was something I went looking to connect with for myself in college, and found, to my surprise that what I knew as bah-chi ball was actually pronounced boh-cheh and wasn’t even that popular back in the “old country”.
What I’ve come to realize, and what Netflix nailed perfectly in this film with such a revered cast (that feels like a Godfather, Goodfellas, Sopranos, and Rocky reunion all in one), is that your own culture can often feel just out of reach. Vince Vaughn’s character’s unrelentless attempts to recreate his mother and grandmother’s favorite dishes, his efforts to preserve a culture that at it’s core is distinctly American, reminds me of my own father and his stories about the generations that came before him. Of his reverence for women like the ones played by Talia Shire, Lorraine Bracco, Brenda Vaccaro, and Susan Sarandon. Women who poured their love out through food for their families.
By the end of the film, when Vaughn finally opens a letter from his deceased mother, only to find handwritten recipes for the dishes he had been trying to recreate, I was in tears. I have seen those notecards, that cursive. That’s the culture. The love it represents. That unyielding effort to preserve it all for the next generation. That feeling, of always being one step removed, is kind of the point. There will always be a branch in the family tree above our own with people we never get to meet, and memories we only get to hear about in stories.
Nonnas transforms that sentiment into cinema. Into a celebration of all the Italian-American grandmothers with their own stories worth listening to, their own dishes worth eating. Italian-American’s finally got our own version of My Big Fat Greek Wedding, connected by a shared slew of joke and respect for an entire lamb. Our own version with women who are tougher than nails with knife-sharp wits. Matriarchs who know how to handle their limoncello and know their worth. Whether you feel at home in this world, or are admiring from the outside, Nonnas is a cultural moment that deserves your attention.