Sunday, January 11, 2004
BY CHRISTOPHER POTTER
News Arts Writer
Tevye the dairyman bereft of his cart? Sooner one should separate Linus from his blanket
or Indiana Jones from his bullwhip.
All the same, director Rachel Francisco says Sholom Aleichem's quintessential everyman
will be shorn of his beloved wheelbarrow in Ann Arbor Civic Theatre's new-look production
of "Fiddler on the Roof," opening Thursday at Lydia Mendelssohn.
"Actually, we're using very few props or conventional sets," says Francisco.
"I want the audience to focus on what the actors are doing, not on whether 'That
kitchen should have four, not three plates on the wall!' kind of thing."
The director admits some actors in her 50-member cast "were surprised when I laid out
my concept of the show," an atmospheric approach that saturates the famed Jerry
Bock/Sheldon Harnick musical in the fabulist world of renegade surrealist painter Marc
Chagall.
"Some of them asked, 'We're not gonna have a cart? How can we do the show without
Tevye's cart?' But the absence of these physical elements gives the actors more freedom,
and they're the most important element in the show."
While the script and music in "Fiddler" remain intact, don't expect a
conventional rendering of Aleichem's Jewish village of Anatevka. "I think sometimes
audiences focus so much on the fact that this is 1905 Czarist Russia," says
Francisco. "It's the story that's important to me. And I wanted to bring a new way of
looking at it. "
That's why the Mendelssohn stage backdrops with be covered from ceiling to floor with
gaudy-colored, super-sized renderings by artist Bill Anderson of Chagall's fantastic
Russian-Jewish imagery. And yes, Aleichem's titular fiddler on the roof will be prominent
among the images, replacing a live rooftop fiddler for the show.
"The premise is that what's going on in the villagers' lives is becoming quite
unreal. It's as though their lives are starting to spin out of control although they don't
realize it," Francisco says.
"To me the show's underlying message is of tolerance and peace. What makes people
different? Nothing. And yet people are forced from their homes or worse for no reason
other than their religion or the color of their skin."
Francisco's "fresh version" will also include a dose of more ambitious dance
numbers than one usually sees in "Fiddler" productions, co-created by the
director and choreographer Caitlin Frankel. "We based a lot of the dances on the
original (Jerome) Robbins choreography," says Francisco, "but we've kind of
expanded them, tried to spice them up, make them a little more exciting.
Lead cast members include Mark Bernstein as Tevye, and Kathleen Beardmore as wife Golde.
Amy Bogetto-Weinraub, Marci Roseberg and Anna Boonin play daughters Tzeitel, Hodel and
Chava, while Curt Waugh and Dave Feiertag play husbands-to-be Perchik and Motel. Lisa
Putman is matchmaker Yente, and Anne Bauman plays Fruma-Sarah. Musical director Kimberley
Dolanski will lead a 15-member instrumental ensemble through Bock and Harnick's immortal
song score.