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Fiona Mountford's rating
, Fit as a Fiddler
By
Fiona Mountford
30 May 2007
There's never been much accounting for taste in the subject matter of musicals.
The French Revolution and the Vietnam War seemed unlikely enough excuses for a song, but a pogrom-threatened shtetl in pre-revolutionary Russia is something else entirely. Yet Lindsay Posner's mature, heartfelt, impeccably executed revival, receiving a deserved transfer from Sheffield, is a perfect reminder of why this tune-stuffed show has been fiddling its way to box office gold since 1964.
Posner, nimbly aided by designer Peter McKintosh and choreographer Kate Flatt, constantly underlines the fact that the anchor of Bock, Harnick and Stein's creation, weightier even than the hummability of If I Were A Rich Man and Matchmaker, is the very specificity of its setting.
With every turn of the versatile wooden slats, we feel we are witnessing an existence that real people actually experienced, rather than a vague, Brigadoon-like unreality conjured up solely for the purposes of musical fiction.
Such a firm grip on time and place is, of course, the ideal launch-pad for mighty universal themes: the challengingof age-old customs and the clash of wills between parents and children. You don't have to be an early 20th century Ukrainian Jew with Left-leaning sympathies to sob unreservedly when Hodel explains to her distraught father her reasons for moving to Siberia in the achingly simple Far From The Home I Love.
Henry Goodman isn't Topol but he's first-rate as Tevye, the genial dairyman and father of a brood of headstrong daughters.
Right from Tradition, the opening number and the show's definitive statement of intent, Goodman looks to the shtetl born, as he contemplates his hardworking, hen-pecked life with wry humour and a fine singing voice.
However endless asides to the Almighty accompanied by a repertoire of stock gestures constantly threaten to topple Tevye over into caricature and Goodman duly struggles with his gear change into the big emotional crunch scenes of Act II. The visual tics of Woody Allen are not going to be an adequate response to the break-up of both a family and an entire way of life.
Elsewhere, Beverley Klein makes a busy but mercifully unfussy materfamilias and Alexandra Silber's spirited, soulful Hodel ups the daughters' tunefulness quotient.
Shout it with delight from the rooftops: the Fiddler's back in town.
Booking to 29 September. Box office: 0870 840 1111
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
Reader views (4)
I've seen many versions of Fiddler, but this one is absolutely magnificent and by far the best, mainly because of Henry Goodman but also the whole cast, the set and the choreography. I don't know when I've been so moved and involved. I felt I'd experienced something real and got an entirely new take on several aspects of the story.
What a great show- surely the best on offer in the West End right now.
- Geraldine Aron, London UK, 05/07/2007 19:26
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I have seen many versions of ‘Fiddler on the Roof’ over the years (yes, including the film).
Yesterday (19th June), I witnessed a truly remarkable production – one that outshone every other. It was faultless, and at the end the cast received a justly deserved standing ovation.
Henry Goodman was outstanding as Tevye. He took us through every conceivable emotion as the ‘head of the family’. We laughed, we cried but, best of all; we understood and empathised with every ounce of his joy, frustration and anger.
Sue Kelvin as Golde, gave a magnificent portrayal of a wife and mother who provided the “rock” for (and probably the true head of) the family.
The duet “Do you love me?” was truly inspired acting from both characters as they evaluated their true relationship after 25 years of taking it for granted.
The three older daughters were excellent in both acting and singing, as were all the other principals. The ‘bottle dance’ during the Wedding scene was the most creatively choreographed and executed version of any I have seen, as was the ‘dream’ as Tevye retold his ‘nightmare’ about the supposed wrath of the ghost of Fruma-Sarah.
The set was excellent, as was the Orchestra.
Thank you to all concerned for a very memorable evening.
- Ken Baker, Brentwood, England, 20/06/2007 12:48
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My principal thought by the end, sadly, was that it had been a very long evening. This is no reflection on the energetic, committed performances - movement and most of the singing here are sharply-defined and technically superb - but the piece itself. 'Fiddler' falls between various stools in its laudable desire to get away from Broadway traditions, and remain faithful to its source material. It is a standard musical in that it has production numbers, comedy vignettes and and sentimental moments: but it also offers quantities of would-be seriousness, chiefly about anti-semitism - including an embarrassingly tame pogrom - which don't have the emotional heft needed, and dampen the show's impact, especially at the end (there's no finale to either half).
Very much on the plus side is Goodman's three-dimensional Tevye. Although not a wonderful singer, he acts the role into gutsy reality, and incidentally reveals all the other characters as underwritten symbols - soft-hearted wife, disobedient daughters, comic or stubborn suitors. Sadly, Posner misguidedly has the entire cast chuntering away in vaguely slavic accents so thick, they are occasionally impenetrable - which lends extra inertia to the lengthy dialogue passages.
Set, costumes and staging (including a very effective lighting design) are all admirable, and the pit band sounds like a full orchestra. All in all, this is a four-star production of two-star show. (A last warning: avoid the Savoy's very remote Upper Circle.)
- Adam Sheldon, Kingston, Surrey, 31/05/2007 10:22
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I saw this on Saturday 26th. It was absolutely brilliant. The cast were great the scenery was good. I laughed and cried and can compare it favourably to the last stage show with Topol.
It was a very long show 2 hours 45 minutes including the interval. If anyone had asked me to sit through it again I would have...with real pleasure.
- Linda Harris, London, 31/05/2007 10:02
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