RASHIDA JONES
BORN : FEBRUARY 25, 1976
POSITION : ACTRESS
Like her mother, Peggy Lipton, Rashida Leah Jones is one of those women who, when I tell someone she’s Jewish, I’m often met with disbelief. Rashida and her mother are prime examples of women who don’t fit a lot of people’s stereotypical idea of what Jewish women look like. It’s exasperating, hence this website. We’re not all Bette Midler you know – some of us are Natalie Portman, Gal Gadot, Scarlett Johansson, Winona Ryder, Lauren Bacall, Jill Goodacre, Barbi Benton, Elizabeth Taylor, and Marilyn freaking Monroe.
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So, because of this narrow conception of who and what Jewish women are, I’m thrilled to have Rashida as an M.O.T. (Member of the Tribe).
She’s incredibly nice, smart (she went to Harvard, y’all) and gorgeous. But she never seems to act like she’s aware of how beautiful she is. I know her best from The Office and Parks and Recreation, and in those roles when she enters a room no one is stunned into paralysis by what I’d think is her literally stunning appearance. Everyone acts likes she’s, I don’t know, mortal or something. This stretches credulity since if she walked into any place where I worked I’d either immediately kneel or run for the door.
Anyway, she’s awesome.
Jones’father was famed media mogul and music producer Quincy Jones. Rashida’s mother, Peggy Lipton was an Ashkenazi Jew who’d grown up in an observant home. Rashida and her sister were raised in Reform Judaism, with Rashida attending Hebrew school as a child. In a 2007 interview, Rashida spoke of how much Judaism meant to her growing up:
“We always celebrated the High Holidays. I did fast in high school for Yom Kippur and attend services. We always went to Seder for Passover. I really liked the cultural and the familial side of Judaism. It was always the most comfortable place for me, making time for family and community.”
Though being biracial was more unusual a few decades ago than it is today, happily Rashida grew up without thinking there was anything anomalous about her blended family. Jones recalls being raised in a sort of a “utopian enclave” including other families who were half-black and half-Jewish. This “utopian enclave” included families like Sidney Lumet and Gail Jones, Sidney Poitier and Joanna Shimkus, and Richard Rudolph and Minnie Ripperton, whose daughter, the hilarious <Maya Rudolph> became one of Rashida’s best friends.
In her interview, Jones reflected on how finding out more about her Jewish heritage has given her a feeling of profound awe — and gratitude:
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“I did that show, Who Do You Think You Are?, and we went to Latvia, to the village where my mom’s great-grandfather was born and the whole village was devastated during the war and everybody was killed,” she said. “And I just think about how ridiculous it is that I exist because the lineage on both sides, the probability that I would exist, a Black Jew in 2021 — and succeed and thrive — is a miracle. And it’s something I do not take for granted.”
Jones gave birth to a son in 2018, whom she shares with her partner, Jewish musician Ezra Koenig (frontman for the band Vampire Weekend). Welcome to the “tribe” little Isaiah!