Playwright: Joseph Stein ( book ), Jerry Bock ( music ), Sheldon Harnick ( lyrics ). At: Light Opera Works, Cahn Auditorium, 600 Emerson St., Evanston. Tickets: 847-920-5360; www.LightOperaWorks.com; $34-$94. Runs through: Aug. 24
A good production of a great Broadway musical always is most welcome, and so it is with Fiddler on the Roof as Light Opera Works ( LOW ) wrings the joy and tears from this iconic work. It's a handsome production with Adam Veness' façade of Anatevka village houses warmly lit ( sometimes with primary colors ) by Andrew H. Meyers. The scenic design refreshingly reflects research among turn-of-the-last-century photos, without reliance on Marc Chagall-style imagery with which Fiddler long has been associated.
This Fiddler also boasts a strong cast of singing actors, each and every one appropriate in age and personality to his/her role as directed and choreographed by Rudy Hogenmiller. As Tevye, Alex Honzen has the physical stature the role seems to demand and a voice capable of cantorial flourishes that sound straight from the synagogue. He and lithe Jenny Lamb as Golde areblessedly, for oncethe correct age for this pair of Ukrainian rural Jews, which is to say barely passed 40. Too often they are played by graybeards. They are supported, as one has come to expect at LOW, by a wonderful orchestra ( Roger L. Bingaman conducting ) with the lush sound of a full string section, playing the show's original Broadway orchestrations.
But something is missing that makes the difference between a good production of a great Broadway musical and a great production of a great musical. For one, the scenic design is atmospheric but static with everything on one level. Second story windows of the village houses glow with light, but don't open and aren't actually used. Actors carry furniture on and off rather than having scenic pieces flown or on wagons ( small platforms that role on/off from the wings ). This reveals the limits either of Cahn Auditorium's long-outdated technology or the production budget, or both.
More seriously, the dialog scenes sometimes are sluggish and, because they are unamplified, frequently difficult to hear. This means a lot of the jokesand Fiddler is a funny showare lost along the way. Additionally, Hogenmiller appears to have instructed his cast to render many jokes as everyday speech, rather than deliver them with snap or exaggeration.
Still, when this Fiddler sings and dances it has all the strengths of this nearly-foolproof show. Hogenmiller's choreography pays occasional tribute to original director and choreographer Jerome Robbins, as in the famous Act I wedding bottle dance, but Hogenmiller's own work has spirit and joy as in the rousing "To Life" and his amusing staging of Tevye's nightmare. And all will be charmed by the utterly simple and sincere rendition of "Do You Love Me?" and the profound beauty of "Sabbath Prayer."
A perfect Fiddler? No. A pleasure nonetheless, right? Of course, right!