Fiddler on the Roof is a musical with music by Jerry Bock, lyrics by Sheldon Harnick, and book by Joseph Stein, set in the Pale of Settlement of Imperial Russia in or around 1905. It is based on "Tevye the Dairyman" and other short stories by Sholem Aleichem. The story centers on Tevye, a milkman in the village of Anatevka, who attempts to maintain his Jewish religious and cultural traditions as outside influences encroach upon his family's lives. He must cope with the strong-willed actions of his three older daughters who wish to marry for love; their choices of husbands are successively less palatable for Tevye. An edict of the tsar eventually evicts the Jews from their village.
The original Broadway production of the show, which opened in 1964, had the first musical theatre run in history to surpass 3,000 performances. Fiddler held the record for the longest-running Broadway musical for almost 10 years until Grease surpassed its run. The production was extraordinarily profitable and highly acclaimed. It won nine Tony Awards, including best musical, score, book, direction and choreography. It spawned five Broadway revivals and a highly successful 1971 film adaptation and has enjoyed enduring international popularity. It has also been a popular choice for school and community productions.[1]
Background
Fiddler on the Roof is based on a series of stories by Sholem Aleichem about his character Tevye the Dairyman, which he wrote in Yiddish between 1894 and 1914 about Jewish life in a village in the Pale of Settlement of Imperial Russia at the turn of the 20th century. The stories are based on Aleichem's own upbringing near Kyiv (fictionalized as Yehupetz). It is also influenced by Life is with People, by Mark Zborowski and Elizabeth Herzog.[2] Aleichem wrote a dramatic adaptation of the stories that he left unfinished at his death, but which was produced in Yiddish in 1919 by the Yiddish Art Theater and made into a film in the 1930s. In the late 1950s, a musical based on the stories, called Tevye and his Daughters, was produced off-Broadway by Arnold Perl.[3]Rodgers and Hammerstein and then Mike Todd briefly considered bringing this musical to Broadway but dropped the idea.[4]
Investors and some in the media worried that Fiddler on the Roof might be considered "too Jewish" to attract mainstream audiences. Other critics considered that it was too culturally sanitized, "middlebrow" and superficial; Philip Roth, writing in The New Yorker, called it shtetl kitsch. For example, it portrays the local Russian officer as sympathetic, instead of brutal and cruel, as Sholom Aleichem had described him. Aleichem's stories ended with Tevye alone, his wife dead and his daughters scattered; at the end of Fiddler, the family members are alive, and most are emigrating together to America.[3][4] The show found the right balance for its time, even if not entirely authentic, to become "one of the first popular post-Holocaust depictions of the vanished world of Eastern European Jewry".[3]Harold Prince replaced the original producer Fred Coe and brought in director/choreographer Jerome Robbins.[5] The writers and Robbins considered naming the musical Tevye, before landing on a title suggested by various paintings by Marc Chagall (Green Violinist (1924), Le Mort (1924), The Fiddler (1912)) that also inspired the original set design. Contrary to popular belief, the "title of the musical does not refer to any specific painting".[6]
During rehearsals, one of the stars, Jewish actor Zero Mostel, feuded with Robbins, whom he held in contempt because Robbins had cooperated with the House Un-American Activities Committee and hid his Jewish heritage from the public.[4] (Mostel, conversely, was admired for his confrontational testimony before the committee that led to his blacklisting in the 1950s.[7]) Other cast members also had run-ins with Robbins, who reportedly "abused the cast, drove the designers crazy [and] strained the good nature of Hal Prince".[4]
Synopsis
Act I
Tevye, a poor Jewish milkman with five daughters, explains the customs of the Jews in the Russianshtetl of Anatevka in 1905, where their lives are as precarious as the perch of a fiddler on a roof ("Tradition"). At Tevye's home, everyone is busy preparing for the Sabbath meal. His sharp-tongued wife, Golde, orders their daughters, Tzeitel, Hodel, Chava, Shprintze and Bielke, about their tasks. Yente, the village matchmaker, arrives to tell Golde that Lazar Wolf, the wealthy butcher, a widower older than Tevye, wants to wed Tzeitel, the eldest daughter. The next two daughters, Hodel and Chava, are excited about Yente's visit, but Tzeitel illustrates how it could have bad results ("Matchmaker, Matchmaker"). A girl from a poor family must take whatever husband Yente brings, but Tzeitel wants to marry her childhood friend, Motel the tailor.
Tevye is delivering milk, pulling the cart himself, as his horse is lame. He asks God: Whom would it hurt "If I Were a Rich Man"? The bookseller tells Tevye news from the outside world of pogroms and expulsions. A stranger, Perchik, hears their conversation and scolds them for doing nothing more than talk. The men dismiss Perchik as a radical, but Tevye invites him home for the Sabbath meal and offers him food and a room in exchange for tutoring his two youngest daughters. Golde tells Tevye to meet Lazar after the Sabbath but does not tell him why, knowing that Tevye does not like Lazar. Worried that Yente will find her a husband soon, Tzeitel tells Motel to ask Tevye for her hand before the Sabbath dinner. Motel resists, as he is afraid of Tevye's temper, and tradition says that a matchmaker must arrange marriages. Motel is also very poor and is saving up to buy a sewing machine before he approaches Tevye, to show that he can support a wife. The family gathers for the "Sabbath Prayer".
After the Sabbath, Tevye meets Lazar for a drink at the village inn, assuming mistakenly that Lazar wants to buy his cow. Once the misunderstanding is cleared up, Tevye agrees to let Lazar marry Tzeitel – with a rich butcher, his daughter will never want for anything. All join in the celebration of Lazar's good fortune; even the Russian youths at the inn join in the celebration and show off their dancing skills ("To Life"). Outside the inn, Tevye happens upon the Russian Constable, who has jurisdiction over the Jews in the town. The Constable warns him that there is going to be a "little unofficial demonstration" in the coming weeks (a euphemism for a minor pogrom). The Constable has sympathy for the Jewish community but is powerless to prevent the violence.
The next morning, after Perchik's lessons with the younger sisters, Tevye's second daughter Hodel mocks Perchik's Marxist interpretation of a Bible story. He, in turn, criticizes her for hanging on to the old traditions of Judaism, noting that the world is changing. To illustrate this, he dances with her, defying the prohibition against opposite sexes dancing together. The two begin to fall in love. Later, a hungover Tevye announces that he has agreed that Tzeitel will marry Lazar Wolf. Golde is overjoyed, but Tzeitel is devastated and begs Tevye not to force her. Motel arrives and tells Tevye that he is the perfect match for Tzeitel and that he and Tzeitel gave each other a pledge to marry. He promises that Tzeitel will not starve as his wife. Tevye is stunned and outraged at this breach of tradition, but impressed at the timid tailor's display of backbone. After some soul-searching ("Tevye's Monologue"), Tevye agrees to let them marry, but he worries about how to break the news to Golde. An overjoyed Motel celebrates with Tzeitel ("Miracle of Miracles").
In bed with Golde, Tevye pretends to be waking from a nightmare. Golde offers to interpret his dream, and Tevye "describes" it ("Tevye's Dream"). Golde's grandmother Tzeitel returns from the grave to bless the marriage of her namesake, but to Motel, not to Lazar Wolf. Lazar's formidable late wife, Fruma-Sarah ("frum" is a Yiddish word for a devout Jew), rises from her grave to warn, in graphic terms, of severe retribution if Tzeitel marries Lazar. The superstitious Golde is terrified, and she quickly counsels that Tzeitel must marry Motel. While returning from town, Tevye's third daughter, the bookish Chava, is teased and intimidated by some gentile youths. One, Fyedka, protects her, dismissing the others. He offers Chava the loan of a book, and a secret relationship begins.
The wedding day of Tzeitel and Motel arrives, and all the Jews join the ceremony ("Sunrise, Sunset") and the celebration ("The Wedding Dance"). Lazar gives a fine gift, but an argument arises with Tevye over the broken agreement. Perchik ends the tiff by breaking another tradition: he crosses the barrier between the men and women to dance with Tevye's daughter Hodel. The celebration ends abruptly when a group of Russians rides into the village to perform the "demonstration". They disrupt the party, damaging the wedding gifts and wounding Perchik, who attempts to fight back, and wreak more destruction in the village. Tevye instructs his family to clean up the mess.
Act II
Fiddler On the Roof by Lev Segal in Netanya, Israel
Months later, Perchik tells Hodel he must return to Kyiv to work for the revolution. He proposes marriage, admitting that he loves her, and says that he will send for her. She agrees ("Now I Have Everything"). They tell Tevye that they are engaged, and he is appalled that they are flouting tradition by making their own match, especially as Perchik is leaving. When he forbids the marriage, Perchik and Hodel inform him that they do not seek his permission, only his blessing. After more soul searching, Tevye relents – the world is changing, and he must change with it ("Tevye's Rebuttal"). He informs the young couple that he gives them his blessing and his permission.
Tevye explains these events to an astonished Golde. "Love", he says, "it's the new style." Tevye asks Golde, despite their own arranged marriage, "Do You Love Me?" After dismissing Tevye's question as foolish, she eventually admits that, after 25 years of living and struggling together and raising five daughters, she does. Meanwhile, Yente tells Tzeitel that she saw Chava with Fyedka. News spreads quickly in Anatevka that Perchik has been arrested and exiled to Siberia ("The Rumor/I Just Heard"), and Hodel is determined to join him there. At the railway station, she explains to her father that her home is with her beloved, wherever he may be, although she will always love her family ("Far From the Home I Love").
Time passes. Motel has purchased a used sewing machine, and he and Tzeitel have had a baby. Chava finally gathers the courage to ask Tevye to allow her marriage to Fyedka. Again Tevye reaches deep into his soul, but marriage outside the Jewish faith is a line he will not cross. He forbids Chava to speak to Fyedka again. When Golde brings news that Chava has eloped with Fyedka, Tevye wonders where he went wrong ("Chavaleh Sequence"). Chava returns and tries to reason with him, but he refuses to speak to her and tells the rest of the family to consider her dead. Meanwhile, rumors are spreading of the Russians expelling Jews from their villages. While the villagers are gathered, the Constable arrives to tell everyone that they have three days to pack up and leave the town. In shock, they reminisce about "Anatevka" and how hard it will be to leave what has been their home for so long.
As the Jews leave Anatevka, Chava and Fyedka stop to tell her family that they are also leaving for Kraków, unwilling to remain among the people who could do such things to others. Tevye still will not talk to her, but when Tzeitel says goodbye to Chava, Tevye prompts her to add "God be with you." Motel and Tzeitel go to Poland as well but will join the rest of the family when they have saved up enough money. As Tevye, Golde and their two youngest daughters leave the village for America, the fiddler begins to play. Tevye beckons with a nod, and the fiddler follows them out of the village.
↑ The 2004 revival featured a song for Yente and some women of the village (Rivka and Mirala) titled "Topsy Turvy", discussing the disappearing role of the matchmaker in society. The number replaced "The Rumor/I Just Heard".
Principal characters
All of the characters are Jewish, except as noted:[8][9]
Tevye, a poor milkman with five daughters. A firm supporter of the traditions of his faith, he finds many of his convictions tested by the actions of his three oldest daughters.
Golde, Tevye's sharp-tongued wife.
Tzeitel, their oldest daughter, about nineteen. She loves her childhood friend Motel and marries him, even though he's poor, begging her father not to force her to marry Lazar Wolf.
Hodel, their daughter, about seventeen. Intelligent and spirited, she falls in love with Perchik and later joins him in Siberia.
Chava, their daughter, about fifteen. A shy and bookish girl, who falls in love with Fyedka.
Motel Kamzoil, a poor but hardworking tailor who loves, and later marries, Tzeitel.
Perchik, a student revolutionary who comes to Anatevka and falls in love with Hodel. He leaves for Kyiv, is arrested and exiled to Siberia.
Fyedka, a young Christian. He shares Chava's passion for reading and is outraged by the Russians' treatment of the Jews.
Lazar Wolf, the wealthy village butcher. Widower of Fruma-Sarah. Attempts to arrange a marriage for himself to Tzeitel.
Yente, the gossipy village matchmaker who matches Tzeitel and Lazar.
Grandma Tzeitel, Golde's dead grandmother, who rises from the grave in Tevye's "nightmare".
Fruma-Sarah, Lazar Wolf's dead wife, who also rises from the grave in the "nightmare".
Rabbi, the wise village leader.
Constable, the head of the local Russian police, a Christian.
Following its tryout at Detroit's Fisher Theatre in July and August 1964,[20] then Washington in August to September,[21] the original Broadway production opened on September 22, 1964, at the Imperial Theatre, transferred in 1967 to the Majestic Theatre and in 1970 to the Broadway Theatre, and ran for a record-setting total of 3,242 performances.[22] The production was directed and choreographed by Jerome Robbins – his last original Broadway staging.[23] The set, designed in the style of Marc Chagall's paintings, was by Boris Aronson.[24] A colorful logo for the production, also inspired by Chagall's work, was designed by Tom Morrow. Chagall reportedly did not like the musical.[4]
The cast included Zero Mostel as Tevye the milkman, Maria Karnilova as his wife Golde (both won a Tony for their performances), Beatrice Arthur as Yente the matchmaker, Austin Pendleton as Motel, Bert Convy as Perchik the student revolutionary, Gino Conforti as the fiddler, and Julia Migenes as Hodel. Mostel ad-libbed increasingly as the run went on, "which drove the authors up the wall".[22]Joanna Merlin originated the role of Tzeitel, which was later assumed by Bette Midler during the original run. Carol Sawyer was Fruma Sarah, Adrienne Barbeau took a turn as Hodel, and Pia Zadora played the youngest daughter, Bielke. Both Peg Murray and Dolores Wilson made extended appearances as Golde, while other stage actors who have played Tevye include Herschel Bernardi, Theodore Bikel and Harry Goz (in the original Broadway run), and Leonard Nimoy. Mostel's understudy in the original production, Paul Lipson, went on to appear as Tevye in more performances than any other actor (until Chaim Topol), clocking over 2,000 performances in the role in the original run and several revivals.[25]Florence Stanley took over the role of Yente nine months into the run.[26] The production earned $1,574 for every dollar invested in it.[27] It was nominated for ten Tony Awards, winning nine, including Best Musical, score, book, direction and choreography, and acting awards for Mostel and Karnilova.[22]
The original London West End production opened on February 16, 1967, at Her Majesty's Theatre and played for 2,030 performances.[28] It starred Topol as Tevye, a role he had previously played in Tel Aviv, and Miriam Karlin as Golde. Alfie Bass, Lex Goudsmit and Barry Martin eventually took over as Tevye.[29] Topol later played Tevye in the 1971 film adaptation, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award, and in several revivals over the next four decades.[30] The show was revived in London for short seasons in 1983 at the Apollo Victoria Theatre[14] and in 1994 at the London Palladium.[31][32]
Broadway revivals
The first Broadway revival opened on December 28, 1976, and ran for 176 performances at the Winter Garden Theatre. Zero Mostel starred as Tevye. Robbins directed and choreographed. A second Broadway revival opened on July 9, 1981, and played for a limited run (53 performances) at Lincoln Center's New York State Theater. It starred Herschel Bernardi as Tevye and Karnilova as Golde. Other cast members included Liz Larsen, Fyvush Finkel, Lawrence Leritz and Paul Lipson. Robbins directed and choreographed. The third Broadway revival opened on November 18, 1990, and ran for 241 performances at the George Gershwin Theatre. Topol starred as Tevye, and Marcia Lewis was Golde. Robbins' production was reproduced by Ruth Mitchell and choreographer Sammy Dallas Bayes. The production won the Tony Award for Best Revival.
The fifth Broadway revival began previews on November 20 and opened on December 20, 2015, at the Broadway Theatre, with concept and choreography based on the original by Robbins. Bartlett Sher directed, and Hofesh Shechter choreographed. The cast starred Danny Burstein as Tevye, with Jessica Hecht as Golde, Alexandra Silber as Tzeitel, Adam Kantor as Motel, Ben Rappaport as Perchik, Samantha Massell as Hodel and Melanie Moore as Chava. Judy Kuhn replaced Hecht as Golde on November 22, 2016, for the last five weeks of the run.[36] Designers include Michael Yeargan (sets), Catherine Zuber (costumes) and Donald Holder (lighting).[37] Initial reviews were mostly positive, finding Burstein and the show touching.[38] The production was nominated for three Tony Awards but won none. It closed on December 31, 2016, after 463 performances.[39] The U.S./Canadian tour of the Sher-directed production began in 2018[citation needed] and was interrupted in March 2020 by the COVID-19 pandemic; it resumed in 2021[40] and continued into 2023. The role of Tevye has been played by Yehezkel Lazarov into 2022, Danny Arnold then assumed the role for several months, and the last months are being played by Jonathan Hashmonay.[41]
London revivals
Fiddler was first revived in London in 1983 at the Apollo Victoria Theatre (a four-month season starring Topol)[14] and again in 1994 at the London Palladium for two months and then on tour, again starring Topol, and directed and choreographed by Sammy Dallas Bayes, recreating the Robbins production.[32]
After a two-month tryout at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England, a London revival opened on May 19, 2007, at the Savoy Theatre starring Henry Goodman as Tevye, Beverley Klein as Golde, Alexandra Silber as Hodel, Damian Humbley as Perchik and Victor McGuire as Lazar Wolf. The production was directed by Lindsay Posner. Robbins' choreography was recreated by Sammy Dallas Bayes (who did the same for the 1990 Broadway revival), with additional choreography by Kate Flatt.[42]
A production played at the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre from July 27 to September 28, 2024, directed by Jordan Fein, starring Adam Dannheisser as Tevye, Lara Pulver as Golde, Liv Andrusier as Tzeitel, Georgia Bruce as Hodel, Hannah Bristow as Chava, Beverley Klein as Yente, Dan Wolff as Motel and Daniel Krikler as Perchik.[47] The production was designed by Tom Scutt and choreographed by Julia Cheng.[48]
Other UK productions
A 2003 national tour played for seven months, with a radical design, directed by Julian Woolford and choreographed by Chris Hocking. The production's minimalist set and costumes were monochromatic, and Fruma-Sarah was represented by a 12-foot puppet. This production was revived in 2008 starring Joe McGann.[49]
A production at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre ran from July 27 to 28 September 28, 2024, directed by Jordan Fein and starring Adam Dannheisser as Tevye.[52] A review by Mark Lawson in The Guardian gave it five stars out of five and praised its use of the outdoor setting its focus on "the tradition of deflective Jewish humour" and an ending that invites "a broader reflection of displacement and refugee status".[53]
Australian productions
The original Australian production opened on June 16, 1967, at Her Majesty's Theatre in Sydney. It starred Hayes Gordon as Tevye and Brigid Lenihan as Golde.[54] The production ran for two years.[55] The first professional revival tour was staged by the Australian Opera in 1984 with Gordon again playing Tevye. A young Anthony Warlow played Fyedka.[56]
In 1998, 2005, 2006 and 2007, Topol recreated his role as Tevye in Australian productions, with seasons in Sydney,[57] Brisbane,[58] Melbourne,[59] Perth, Wellington and Auckland.[60] The musical was again revived in Melbourne and Sydney in 2015–2016 with Anthony Warlow as Tevye, Sigrid Thornton as Golde and Lior as Motel.[61]
The musical was an international hit, with early productions playing throughout Europe, in South America, Africa and Australia; 100 different productions were mounted in the former West Germany in the first three decades after the musical's premiere, and within five years after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, 23 productions were staged in the former East Germany; and it was the longest-running musical ever seen in Tokyo.[72] According to BroadwayWorld, the musical has been staged "in every metropolitan city in the world from Paris to Beijing."[73]
A Hebrew language staging was produced in Tel Aviv by the Israeli impresarioGiora Godik in the 1960s.[74] This version was so successful that in 1965 Godik produced a Yiddish version translated by Shraga Friedman.[75] A 2008 Hebrew-language production ran at the Cameri Theatre in Tel Aviv for more than six years. It was directed by Moshe Kepten, choreographed by Dennis Courtney and starred Natan Datner.[76][77]
Un violon sur le toît was produced in French at Paris's théâtre Marigny from November 1969 to May 1970, resuming from September to January 1971 (a total of 292 performances) with Ivan Rebroff as Tevye and Maria Murano as Golde. Another adaptation was produced in 2005 at the théâtre Comédia in Paris with Franck Vincent as Tevye and Isabelle Ferron as Golde.[78] The Stratford Shakespeare Festival produced the musical from April to October 2013 at the Festival Theatre directed and choreographed by Donna Feore. It starred Scott Wentworth as Tevye.[79] An Italian version, Il violinista sul tetto, with lyrics sung in Yiddish and the orchestra on stage also serving as chorus, was given a touring production in 2004, with Moni Ovadia as Tevye and director; it opened at Teatro Municipale Valli in Reggio Emilia.[80]
The musical receives about 500 amateur productions a year in the US alone.[81]
In the film version, the character of Yente is reduced, and Perchik's song to Hodel "Now I Have Everything" is cut and replaced by a scene in Kyiv. The "Chagall color palette" of the original Broadway production was exchanged for a grittier, more realistic depiction of the village of Anatevka.[85][86]
Theatre historian John Kenrick wrote that the original Broadway cast album released by RCA Victor in 1964, "shimmers – an essential recording in any show lover's collection", praising the cast. The remastered CD includes two recordings not on the original album, the bottle dance from the wedding scene and "Rumor" performed by Beatrice Arthur. In 2020, the recording was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".[87] Kenrick writes that while the original Broadway cast version is the clear first choice among recordings of this musical, he also likes the Columbia Records studio cast album with Bernardi as Tevye; the film soundtrack, although he feels that the pace drags a bit; and some of the numerous foreign versions, including the Israeli, German and Japanese casts.[88]
Parodies relating to the show have included Antenna on the Roof (Mad magazine #156, January 1973), which speculated about the lives of Tevye's descendants living in an assimilated 1970s suburban America.[90] In the film Mrs. Doubtfire (1993), Robin Williams parodies "Matchmaker".[92] In a 1994 Animaniacs parody, Pigeon on the Roof, the Goodfeathers decide to marry their girlfriends; song parodies include "Scorsese" ("Tradition"), "Egg Hatcher" ("Matchmaker") and others.[93] In 2001, the H. P. Lovecraft Historical Society published a musical theatre and album parody called A Shoggoth on the Roof, which sets music from Fiddler to a story based on the works of H. P. Lovecraft.[94] Spanish comedian and TV-host Jose Mota parodied "If I Were a Rich Man" with the song "Si no fuera rico" ("If I weren't a rich man") during his 2008 New Year's Eve special.[95]
References to the musical on television have included a 2005 episode of Gilmore Girls titled "Jews and Chinese Food", involving a production of the musical.[96] A skit by The Electric Company is about a village fiddler with a fear of heights, so he is deemed "Fiddler on the Chair". In the Family Guy episode "When You Wish Upon a Weinstein" (2003), William Shatner is depicted as playing Tevye in a scene from Fiddler.[97] The second episode of Muppets Tonight, in 1996, featured Garth Brooks doing a piece of "If I were a Rich Man" in which he kicks several chickens off the roof. "The Rosie Show", a 1996 episode of The Nanny, parodied the dream scene, when Mr. Sheffield fakes a dream to convince Fran not to be a regular on a TV show. A 2011 episode of NBC's Community, entitled "Competitive Wine Tasting", included a parody titled Fiddla, Please! with an all-black cast dressed in Fiddler on the Roof costumes, singing "It's Hard to Be Jewish in Russia, Yo".[98]Chabad.org kicked off their 2008 "To Life" telethon with a pastiche of the fiddle solo and bottle dance from the musical.[99]
Broadway references have included Spamalot, where a "Grail dance" sends up the "bottle dance" in Fiddler's wedding scene.[100] In 2001, Chicago's Improv Olympic produced a well-received parody, "The Roof Is on Fiddler", that used most of the original book of the musical but replaced the songs with 1980s pop songs.[101] In 2004 the original Broadway cast of the musical Avenue Q and the Broadway 2004 revival cast of Fiddler on the Roof collaborated for a Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS benefit and produced an approximately 10-minute-long show, "Avenue Jew", that incorporated characters from both shows, including puppets. The song "Sunrise, Sunset" appears in the direct-to-video animated Disney film "The Lion King 1½".[citation needed]
Covers
Songs from the musical have been covered by notable artists. For example, in 1964, jazz saxophonist Cannonball Adderley recorded the album Fiddler on the Roof, which featured jazz arrangements of eight songs from the musical. In a retrospective review AllMusic awarded the album 4 stars, stating, "Cannonball plays near his peak; this is certainly the finest album by this particular sextet".[102] That same year, Eydie Gormé released a single of "Matchmaker",[103] and jazz guitarist Wes Montgomery recorded the same tune for his album Movin' Wes.[104]
The song "Sunrise, Sunset" is often played at weddings,[116] and in 2011 Sheldon Harnick wrote two versions of the song, suitable for same-sex weddings, with minor word changes. For example, for male couples, changes include "When did they grow to be so handsome".[116]
Fiddler's original Broadway production in 1964 was nominated for ten Tony Awards, winning nine, including Best Musical, score, and book, and Robbins won for best direction and choreography. Mostel and Karnilova won as best leading actor and best featured actress. In 1972, the show won a special Tony on becoming the longest-running musical in Broadway history.
Its revivals have also been honored. At the 1981 Tony Awards, Bernardi was nominated as best actor. Ten years later, the 1991 revival won for best revival, and Topol was nominated as best actor. The 2004 revival was nominated for six Tony Awards and three Drama Desk Awards but won none. The 2007 West End revival was nominated for Olivier Awards for best revival, and Goodman was nominated as best actor. The 2019 West End revival won the Olivier Award for best revival, and it received a further 7 nominations.
↑ He staged Jerome Robbins' Broadway, a "greatest hits" collection of some of his most famous stagings, at the Imperial Theatre on February 26, 1989, which ran for 633 performances.
↑ Kantor, p. 302: "The 1960s was the decade that nurtured long-running blockbusters in unprecedented quantities: ten musicals passed the rarefied 1,000 performance mark, three of them passed the 2,000 mark (Hello, Dolly!, a Merrick smash, grossed $27 million on Broadway), and one, Fiddler on the Roof, passed the 3,000 mark, earning back $1,574 for every dollar put into it."
↑ "'Fiddler' received with enthusiasm". The Canberra Times. Vol.58, no.17, 799. Australian Capital Territory, Australia. June 22, 1984. p.13. Retrieved January 25, 2018– via National Library of Australia.
Chaim Topol, mononymously known as Topol, was an Israeli actor and singer. He is best known for his portrayal of Tevye, the lead role in the stage musical Fiddler on the Roof and the 1971 film adaptation, performing this role more than 3,500 times from 1967 through 2009.
Tevye the Dairyman, also translated as Tevye the Milkman is the fictional narrator and protagonist of a series of short stories by Sholem Aleichem, and their various adaptations, the most famous being the musical Fiddler on the Roof, which premiered on Broadway in 1964, and its 1971 film adaptation. Tevye is a pious Jewish dairyman living in the Russian Empire, the patriarch of a family including several troublesome daughters. The village of Boyberik, where the stories are set, is based on the town of Boyarka, Ukraine, then part of the Russian Empire. Boyberik is a suburb of Yehupetz, where most of Tevye's customers live.
Yenta or Yente is a Yiddish woman's given name. It is a variant form of the name Yentl, which ultimately is thought to be derived from the Italian word gentile, meaning 'noble' or 'refined'. The name has entered American English only in the form yenta in the senses of "meddler, busybody, blabbermouth, gossip" and is not only used to refer to women. Both the forms yenta and yente are used in Yinglish to refer to someone who is a gossip or a busybody.
Philip "Fyvush" Finkel was an American actor and director known as a star of Yiddish theater and for his role as lawyer Douglas Wambaugh on the television series Picket Fences, for which he earned an Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series in 1994. He is also known for his portrayal of Harvey Lipschultz, a crotchety history teacher, on the television series Boston Public.
"If I Were a Rich Man" is a song in the 1964 musical Fiddler on the Roof, written by Sheldon Harnick and Jerry Bock. It is sung by the main character, Tevye, and reflects his aspirations. Its title was inspired by a 1902 monologue by Sholem Aleichem in Yiddish, Ven ikh bin Rothschild, a reference to the wealth of the Rothschild family, although the content is different, and its words come partly from passages in Aleichem's 1899 short tale The Bubble Bursts. Monologue and tale both appeared in English in a 1949 collection of stories called Tevye's Daughters.
Rosalind Harris is an American theater and film actress. She is best known for her portrayal of Tzeitel, the eldest daughter of Tevye, in the 1971 film version of Fiddler on the Roof. She also starred as Tzeitel in the Broadway musical, having replaced Bette Midler. Nearly 20 years after the film, Harris played mother Golde in a touring stage revival of Fiddler on the Roof; Topol, the Israeli actor who played her father Tevye in the film, reprised his role, now playing her husband.
Maria Karnilova was an American dancer and actress. She was initially known legally as Maria Karniloff.
"Tradition" is the opening number for the 1964 Broadway musical Fiddler on the Roof. In the song, the main character, Tevye, explains the roles of each social class in the village of Anatevka, and how the traditional roles of people like the matchmaker, the beggar, and the rabbi contribute to the village. The song also mentions the constable, the priest, and the other non-Jews with whom they rarely interact. Later in the song, an issue involving an argument between two men about selling the other person a horse and delivering a mule creates a ruckus in the village. Overall, the song sets up the major theme of the villagers trying to continue their traditions and keep their society running as the world around them changes.
Neva Small is an American theatrical, film, and television actress and singer. She made her singing debut at the age of 10 at the New York City Opera, and her Broadway debut the following year. She has numerous acting credits on and Off-Broadway. She is best known for her portrayal of Chava, Tevye's third daughter and the one who marries a Gentile, in the 1971 film Fiddler on the Roof.
Fiddler on the Roof is a 1971 American period musical film produced and directed by Norman Jewison from a screenplay written by Joseph Stein, based on the stage musical by Stein, Jerry Bock, and Sheldon Harnick, which premiered on Broadway in 1964. Set in early 20th-century Imperial Russia, the film centers on Tevye, a poor Jewish milkman who is faced with the challenge of marrying off his five daughters amidst the growing tension in his shtetl. The cast also features Norma Crane, Leonard Frey, Molly Picon, Paul Mann, Rosalind Harris, Michèle Marsh, Neva Small and Paul Michael Glaser. The musical score, composed by Bock with lyrics by Harnick, was adapted and conducted by John Williams.
Tevye and His Seven Daughters is a 1968 Israeli drama film directed by Menahem Golan. Based on stories by Sholem Aleichem, which were also the basis for the stage musical and 1971 film, both titled Fiddler on the Roof.
"Sunrise, Sunset" is a song from the musical Fiddler on the Roof written in 1964 by composer Jerry Bock and lyricist Sheldon Harnick. The song is performed at the wedding of Tzeitel. The two parents sing about how they can't believe their daughter and her groom have grown up, while Hodel and Perchik sing about whether there may be a wedding in the near future for them.
"Matchmaker, Matchmaker" is a song from the 1964 musical Fiddler on the Roof, with music by Jerry Bock and lyrics by Sheldon Harnick. The play was later made into a film in 1971. The story revolves around a poor Jewish milkman, Tevye, and his five daughters, as he attempts to maintain his Jewish traditions. His three eldest daughters marry, but each daughter's choice of husband moves further and further away from their traditions.
Alexandra Silber is an American actress, singer, writer and educator. She has performed roles on Broadway, in London's West End, on television and film, and concert stages. Among other stage roles, in London, she created the role of Laura Fairlie in The Woman in White (2005), played Hodel in Fiddler on the Roof (2007) and Julie Jordan in Carousel (2008). In New York, she appeared in Hello Again (2010), Master Class (2011), created the role of Sara Jane in Arlington (2012–14) and as Tzeitel in the Broadway revival of Fiddler on the Roof (2015).
Shmuel Rodensky was a Russian-born Israeli actor whose stage, film, and television career in Israel and West Germany spanned six decades. He immigrated to Mandatory Palestine in 1924 and studied drama at the Eretz Israel Theatre in Tel Aviv. After performing with several theatre companies between 1928 and 1948, he joined Habima Theatre in 1949 and became one of its principal players. He was known as "the Israeli Laurence Olivier". In 1968 Rodensky traveled to Hamburg to join the German-language production of Fiddler on the Roof, playing the lead role of Tevye the Dairyman. He performed this role more than 1,400 times throughout West Germany and Switzerland. His notable film roles include the lead in the 1968 Israeli film Tevye and His Seven Daughters, Simon Wiesenthal in the 1974 Anglo-German film The Odessa File, and Jethro in the 1974 BBC television miniseries Moses the Lawgiver. He was the recipient of numerous honors in both Israel and West Germany, including the Federal Service Cross from the Federal Republic of Germany and the Israel Prize.
Broken Barriers, also known as Khava is a 1919 American Yiddish silent film, based on author Sholem Aleichem's stock character Tevye the Dairyman.
Fidler Afn Dakh is a Yiddish-language adaptation of the musical Fiddler on the Roof translated and adapted by Shraga Friedman. The adaptation revisits the 1894 collection of Yiddish short stories on which Fiddler on the Roof is based, about Tevye the Dairyman. Friedman created the translation for a 1965 Israeli production. It was produced by the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene (NYTF) in New York City in 2018 and transferred off-Broadway to Stage 42 in 2019.
Fiddler: A Miracle of Miracles is a 2019 American documentary film about the creation and significance of the 1964 musical Fiddler on the Roof. Directed by Max Lewkowicz, it features interviews with Fiddler creators such as Jerry Bock, Sheldon Harnick, Joseph Stein, and Harold Prince, as well as scholars, actors, and other musical theatre figures such as Stephen Sondheim and Lin-Manuel Miranda. The documentary includes rarely-seen footage of the original Broadway cast as well as interviews with creators, actors, theatrical figures, and scholars.
Jana Robbins, née Marsha Eisenberg, is a Tony, Olivier and Drama Desk Award-winning American producer, actress, director, teacher, and speaker. She has produced and won awards for her West End, Broadway and Off-Broadway productions.
References
Bloom, Ken; Frank Vlastnik (October 1, 2004). Broadway Musicals: The 101 Greatest Shows of All Time. New York, New York: Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers. ISBN1-57912-390-2., p.98
Altman, Richard (1971). The Making of a Musical: Fiddler on the Roof. Crown Publishers.
Isenberg, Barbara (2014). Tradition!: The Highly Improbable, Ultimately Triumphant Broadway-to-Hollywood Story of Fiddler on the Roof, the World's Most Beloved Musical. New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN978-0-312-59142-7.
Solomon, Alisa (2013). Wonder of Wonders: A Cultural History of Fiddler on the Roof. Metropolitan Books. ISBN0805092609.
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