Role: Fyedka
Photos by Eric Chazankin
My fourth and final show of 2023 was Fiddler
on the Roof. It was through this show that I achieved a long-desired goal-
do four shows within a calendar year, a feat I had not accomplished since 2014.
I had not been able to do it since that year because in the job I had in the years that followed, they were kind enough to let me have time off to do shows, but I had to
be careful. I didn’t want to take their kindness for granted or overstay my
welcome.
Changing jobs in 2021 gave me weekends off and the freedom to do as much theatre as I wished without having to ask for time off. For me, that was four shows in a year, but even with the freedom of having weekends off, that was still easier said than done. I only managed to do two shows in 2022. There were not too many opportunities for me and Covid complicated matters. In 2023 I got cast in one show and then a second one. Not long after I got cast in a third show, the theatre companies of Sonoma County announced their seasons one by one, and it seemed like getting one more could very well become a reality. But which one?
Fiddler was not my first choice out of those lined up for the fall. My
first choice had been Hello Dolly at
Spreckels Theater Company because it worked the best with my schedule and the
company was in the town where I lived. Unfortunately, I was not cast in that,
nor was I cast in The Sound of Music at
Cinnabar Theater, and I did not want to do The
Addams Family at Novato Theater Company. By the time of this audition, I
was running out of time and options. I had done the general auditions at
At the end of June, while I was starting performances for Joesph
and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, I found out that the director of
Fiddler was Joe Gellura, who just happened to be the dirctor for Joesph. Perfect!
I might just have a decent shot at getting in after all. Shortly after, I received
an email about the audition signups, which were fortunately on a night when I
had nothing else planned.
The auditions were scheduled for July 5. For this audition the criteria were to sing 32 bars of "your favorite Fiddler song"
and dance auditions. The song part was unusual because, normally, directors
don't want people auditioning to sing songs from the show. Whatever the reason,
I had one character in mind that I wanted to play: Perchik. With that, I
decided to sing 32 bars of his song "Now I Have Everything." In the
show, the song is a duet, but it was easily cut down to just where he
sings.
I had one small worry over this though. The show was slated to begin
performances on September 8 and I had performances for Romeo and Juliet which
ended on September 4, which meant missing most, if not all of tech weekend. Not
only that, I would likely miss several rehearsals due to rehearsals and performances for Romeo and Juliet and I worried that might hurt my chances of
getting cast at all, but even more worried that it would hurt my chances of
getting a major role. I was very clear about my conflicts on my audition form.
Their move.
For this audition, all the people auditioning were brought into the
auditorium together. I was in the room with five other singers and I went up second. The
guy before me did the same song as me and that did not help my confidence.
While the song briefly becomes a duet he did the whole song, with the
accompanist quietly singing the other part, rather than a shortened version
like I did, and he sounded like a better singer than I. Did not help my
confidence. Then unfortunately, the accompanist botched my cut and I had to
start over. Again, did not help my confidence.
And then came the dance part of the audition. The choreographer had something planned for the women auditioning, which had been done before the singing, but for the men, he had us learn the most famous dance in the musical- the bottle dance performed in the wedding at the end of the first act. While learning it, I got a small floor burn on my knee because I was wearing exercise shorts and the knee pads I tried on first were a bit too stretched, probably from overuse or used by someone with thick legs. Once I changed into a tighter pair and put my long pants back on, I started doing much better. When it was time to do it for the director, we had to do it twice and, amazingly, I managed to pull it off, though the first one time was much better than the second. Probably got a little too sure of myself.
The final part of the audition was to read sides from the script. I read for the three young men who marry one of the daughters of the main character, Tevye. I had no interest in the role of Motel, but I read his role to help with the young women who wanted the role of Tzeitel. In the end, the role I wound up reading for the most was Fyedka.
Shortly before the last performance for Joseph, Joe Gellura took me aside and told me he didn't have callbacks for the men because he had an idea where to use them...except me. He told me they were planning another callback and asked me to read for the role of Fyedka. Then a week passed, and I received no word. I saw posts on Facebook stating they needed more people to join, and I hoped that Joe wasn’t becoming the kind of director who just didn’t reach out to you if you were not cast after all. I reached out to him and asked what the status was. Apparently, the date of the callback kept getting changed because the new artistic director of the theatre company wanted to be at the callback. Shortly before getting that answer, I received an email with the details. And then the following day, I received a welcome email from the managing director of the company. So…I guess I am in after all?
And then I looked at the calendar attached to the email and that’s when I got worried. I would still be in rehearsals for Romeo and Juliet during the first two weeks of rehearsal for this show and I would miss all Saturday rehearsals since they were held in the afternoon and that's when Romeo and Juliet would have performances. I thought “What am I doing? Is this fair to them? I don’t know if I can pull this off.”
I ended up going to the callback, the sole purpose of which was to cast the roles of Fyedka and Chava. There were supposed to be two men that night to read for Fyedka, but the other guy never showed up. So, it came down to me and six girls/women who were going for the role of Chava, Fyedka’s love interest, though one was definitely too old. I read two separate scenes with each woman, one by one, while Ginger Beavers, who had been the accompanist for the auditions and was also playing the role of the leading lady Golde, read for the role of Tevye in one of the scenes.
In the end, I was offered ensemble. I figured Fyedka might be a hard role to get because he (usually, though not always) has a solo in the song “To Life” and it’s too high for me. Though I had wanted the role of Perchik, I had my reasons for wanting Fyedka. It would have taken some stress off my mind because for Romeo and Juliet, I had to be clean shaven, and I wouldn’t have had time to grow a full beard between shows. Also, he has no song and only does maybe one dance, which would have helped alleviate stress there. Not quite as much to learn, theoretically. With ensemble, who knows what I’d be doing?
I was not able to attend the first read through rehearsal. I thought I would be able to when we got a rough draft of the rehearsal schedule, which had the first read through listed on a date when I didn’t have rehearsal for Romeo and Juliet. When we got the finalized schedule, the read-through was actually scheduled for two days later. I was able to attend one music rehearsal the following week because I miraculously got the night off from Romeo and Juliet.
I was glad I got at least one night off because no matter what kind of rehearsal it was, I could at least get my script. Luckily for me, it was a music rehearsal, and we went through all the numbers that involved the entire cast which meant I would find out which part I'd be singing and get started memorizing. However, even though I could start learning my things, it did not make me any less worried.
Once Romeo and Juliet opened, I could commit more to rehearsals for this show. The rehearsal schedule was Monday through Thursday evenings and Saturday afternoons, but since I had performances on all those Saturdays, it was not an option. When I returned after being away for a week, it turned out that I was in fact playing Fyedka after all. The deal was, since they wanted everyone possible in the songs “Tradition,” “Sabbath Prayer,” “The Dream,” and “Sunrise Sunset,” I would have to alternate as both him and a Jewish member of the village in the show. My main role required me to be clean-shaven and I did consider adding a fake beard when I was supposed to be a Jewish person, but I decided not to at performance time since the time I had for costume changes didn’t allow (More on that later).
It was a relief not to have to worry about growing a beard. Normally, I would have been disppointed about not getting the role of Perchik, the role I really wanted, but in this case I could make an exception.
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| As Fyedka |
In addition to myself, the rest of the cast included Steven Kent Barker, Ginger Beavers, Ella Park, Megan Bartlett, Lydia Louviere, Courtney Romero, Fallon and Tatum Mullen (twins who alternated the role of Bielke), Laura Davies, Jeff Cote, Daniel Silva, Dwayne Stincelli, Max Bessire, Tracy Hinman, Laura Downing-Lee, Peter Downey, Cristian Caetano, Oliver Sweet, Diego Rodriguez, Maggie Belle, Langston and Kabelo Chuenyane (who both appeared as little boys in a brief scene), and Henry Miller and Samuel Strong (two preteen violin players who alternated the role of the fiddler). Skyler King served as the understudy for the Constable. There was another actor also in the show, but for professional reasons will be referred to as “Anonymous.”
Not everyone listed in the cast was involved from the start. Getting this cast put together was a headache, specifically finding enough men to join, which is often a problem in community musical theatre.
I found out at my first rehearsal that we did not have enough men, both young and older. We had lost at least one man before I could join rehearsals. I was disappointed because this particular man had done Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat with me, and I worked very hard to convince him to join this production. He had been to some dance rehearsals because I saw him on the videos, but then at my first rehearsal I saw his name scratched out. He told me afterwards that he was dealing with work and mental health (he was an ER nurse). He was to play the role of Sasha and shortly after, Diego came in and was given that role. Oliver joined the cast not long after when a teacher of his (also a community actor) recommended the show to him. But even with the people we did have there was one problem.
I came to realize that I was not the one who would be the most worrisome. When I attended my first few rehearsals, I felt I was a little more ahead that some of the others, at least in terms of memorizing my lines and the lyrics to whatever songs I would be in. One or two people had the usual issue with getting off book, but there was still time. The actor playing the role of Avram was another matter entirely; he was too old in body and too old in mind with memory problems. Granted there were other men old in body in the cast, but they still were sharp enough to do a musical. But this particular actor, I could see it in his eyes; I wondered whether he even comprehended what was going on half the time, never being able to keep up even with the script in his hands. Then, with two weeks to go before opening, he quit the show. That was good, since he certainly should not have been doing this, but it was also bad because now we needed a replacement and fast. And that’s when Max joined us after Oliver got him to join. Max was much younger than we might have hoped (he was only sixteen), but we made the necessary adjustments.
On Thursday of my first full week back, we had a rabbi, Irwin Keller, come visit to help get a few scenes just right. First, he led us in a nigun, which is a Jewish prayer song with no words. Then he answered any questions we had, told us about the Jewish faith and just how much Jewish people relate to Fiddler on the Roof. Our largest concern was exactly how a Jewish wedding would be conducted. We did not do what they normally do at wedding receptions, which is hoist the bride and groom on their chairs (not enough people and not enough strong people).
While I was able to get ahead on memorizing my lines and music, the dances were my biggest concern. The rehearsals for those were held on Wednesdays and Saturdays. I couldn’t attend any Saturday rehearsals and the first Wednesday I returned, the choreographer, Joey Favalora, got Covid and was out for that week. I learned what I could from the videos posted online to the callboard, but I still had many questions, like where I needed to be and is this part a "do your own thing" or "do it this way and then this way" and so on and so on. With less than three weeks left before opening, I got scared. I wondered if Joey would have time to help me.
Since the videos of the dances were posted to the online callboard I wouldn't fall too far behind even if I wasn't there on the night they were filmed. I taught myself the dances “To Life,” since I would be Fyedka in that scene and I also taught myself the steps for the sons in “Tradition” since I would be a Jewish son in the first part of that number before cutting out and changing to Fyedka. I began teaching myself the bottle dance just in case I’d have to do it. As it turned out, I did have to do it and at the next choreography rehearsal, Joey and Megan, (who played the role of Hodel and was the dance captain) filled me in on the beginning of that dance. There were still some things I needed to learn for the very end of that one and also for “To Life,” but we ran out of time.
Before doing this show, I had seen five different productions of Fiddler on the Roof: two national tour productions, a community theatre production, a college production and a youth production. I never, never, never thought I’d ever do the bottle dance. I’m not what you’d call a dancer; I can move well, and I have a very technical brain which allows me to pick up the steps, but I’m not a dancer. I wondered whether I was flexible enough to do that dance. You can look up videos on Youtube if you want to see how it’s done.
Once I returned to rehearsals more fully, I found out, since I was playing Fyedka, I would be that role in “To Life” and not one of the Jewish men. I spent a lot of time learning and memorizing the part that the Jewish men sing, only to find out I wasn’t doing that part at all. So, I had to learn the second part that the Russians sing. The singing wasn’t actually the worst part; I didn’t have the high solo, or so I thought. The first night when Joey returned, we ran that dance. On that particular night, the actor who had been given the singing solo was out, I and the other two men who played Russians belted it out and Les liked it so much, he had all four Russian men sing that solo together.
For the longest time I was worried whether I would catch up on my things
since I would miss so many rehearsals. I kept telling people “I’m going to have
a nervous breakdown, I can see it coming.” When we muddled through the two
acts, I realized that the first act would be the main worry for me. In the
second act, I wasn’t onstage much, I had no costume changes since I would be playing just Fyedka, and the set changes on the whole were minimal. The second act of Fiddler is
much more intimate with more focus on Tevye and his family and not as much on
the villagers.
Shortly before tech week, I began to think that I was miscast in the
role.
Rehearsals plowed forward and I had a significant worry over how things would go down once the show opened. There were a few blocking and traffic issues onstage that were not getting addressed. Joe simply did not focus on them. In fact, I had a feeling that he was not making notes in the house and fully getting lost in watching the show.
The dances continued to worry me as the rehearsal period began to run out. We had never had one rehearsal with everyone, especially the men. For the bottle dance, we never had a rehearsal with all five men (Oliver, Diego, Cristian, Daniel and me) doing it in front of a mirror. And we kept having wrenches thrown in the works with the dropouts and new additions and losing a rehearsal when Joey got Covid. By the time we had everyone, we were doing full run-throughs of the show and Joey would not be around anymore since he had to prepare to perform in his own show. There were two dances that needed work, and both involved just the men.
“To Life” and the bottle dance during the wedding scene both needed cleaning up at the end of both numbers. In “to Life,” we were unsure of the last part where we all do a grand right and left and then pose at the front of the stage. Megan worked with us to improve it, but we would have to hope we’d get better in time. The problem with the bottle dance was, in addition to the last part not being clean, we never had the bottles and hats to use at rehearsals or to take home to practice with. Joey brought his own hat, which Diego took home for the longest time. I eventually had to take it from him so I could practice.
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| During "To Life" |
In the end, it didn’t matter because we ended up cheating in that dance. We used plastic bottles, either because they had waited too long to give us real ones to practice with or because they didn’t want too much real glass onstage, and our hats and the bottoms of the bottles had magnets. Also, our hats were fedoras, rather than flat topped ones, which was something I felt to be too modern for this show.
There’s an old saying “too many cooks spoil the broth.” That was definitely ringing true in this show, though in our case, too many directors. There were far too many people who had a lot of directing experience in our cast, one or two of whom I’m willing to bet anything were secretly wishing they were the actual director. Laura Downing Lee (who played the roles of Shaindel and Fruma-Sarah) had a lot of interjections about areas that were not being addressed, like blocking and positions onstage, albeit very legitimate concerns. I had a feeling Peter (who played the Constable) was frustrated because there was “a plethora of ideas” that were going ignored. My thought the whole time was “Sorry, too bad.”
The rehearsal period flew by very quickly. It seemed to fly by because before this show, I was in performances for Romeo and Juliet, which was by all accounts a most wonderful experience, and I couldn’t wait for the weekend to arrive so I could get back to that. Don’t ask me to give a thoroughly detailed account about rehearsals for Fiddler; while I remember some things, like what I’ve already talked about, most of the process is a blur to me. Before opening this show, I had been rehearsing and performing in two other shows since May; I hadn’t had a weekend day to myself since June. In the mad rush that was my life at that time, there came a moment, two days before opening for Fiddler when I found myself standing in the theater, looking around and thinking, “How the hell did I get here?" I had been to rehearsals, I had learned my things, but I had very few precise memories of it all happening.
When tech weekend arrived, I was not available for most of it. I had a performance of Romeo and Juliet which was fifty minutes away. When I finally arrived, we were about to come to my first set change in the second act, which was actually the first thing I did in that half of the show. As I brought out the piece of furniture I moved, Celina, our stage manager, was saying whatever she was saying in the booth to the other people in the crew when she saw me and said into the microphone “Wait a minute, is that Michael?” A little bit later was one of my scenes in the second act. Celina later said to me “Your timing could not have been more perfect.” (Well, I do try my best.) I was only at that rehearsal for little more than an hour and we ended up finishing running all the light and sound cues in one day. I was a bit upset because there was a cast party for Romeo and Juliet that I had to miss and since it was so far away, there wasn’t much point in going driving all the way back.
The first act was going to be a hard one for everybody, in terms of scenes and songs, costume changes, and set changes. As I mentioned earlier, the second act would be a breeze. As Celina remarked (and I’m paraphrasing), “It’s not even funny how easy the second act is.” She was specifically talking about set changes, but in terms of everything, it would be easier. I knew I would not be able to help too much with set changes in the first act because I had to keep my costume changes in mind.
I spent days planning my costume changes in my mind from the moment I went in for a fitting. I had three separate pairs of pants, one for being a Jewish character, one black pair for being Fyedka and one black pair for being a bottle dancer. I had a red shirt, vest and prayer shawl for when I was a Jewish person and a different shirt for Fyedka. Finally, I had three different hats: a yarmulke, a hat for when I’d be Fyedka and a hat I would have as a Jewish son, which I initially only wore in "Tradition," but started wearing it during "The Dream" as the run progressed.
There were four of us who had to do one particular costume change from Jewish villager in "Sabbath Prayer" to Russian in "To Life" : me, Diego, Oliver and Daniel. It was a nightmare for all of us. Even though the costumes looked simple, they were certainly not. I'm not sure the costume designer took quick changes into account. Or she simply didn’t realize how little time we had to change. Our Russian shirt was big enough to get over our Jewish person costume, but it was hard to get on because we had an elastic sash sewn on it that kept getting tangled every way. In the script, there’s the set change music followed by half a page of dialogue, but that’s it. I had to beg to make my vest Velcro and honestly, we should have just been given one universal pair of black pants.
While we're on the subject of clothes, I'd like to note one thing about Celina. In addition to being a very level-headed and intelligent stage manager, she was also a very well dressed one once performances began. No one ever sees the stage manager since that person is up in the booth calling the cues, but that didn't stop Celina from dressing to impress. Every night she wore a skirt and a different and stylish top, with her hair and make-up done and sometimes even wearing rhinestones around her eyes. I told her at one point she always wore the best things. Someone should have taken a picture of each outfit she wore and made a collage or a reel.
“To Life” continued to be problematic. Since we never had a full music or dance rehearsal with everyone, it was very shaky. The fact that at least two men joined the show a little later in the process also slowed us up. The song begins as a duet between Tevye and Lazar Wolfe, then the rest of the Jewish men join in, then the Russians sing their part and it ends in a dance. The men who played the Jewish men were having trouble with their cue to start singing. From where I was sitting, I saw Les raising his arms to cue them in clear as day, but they did not. It was hard at the end of the dancing part because there was not a loud and clear music cue for us, though we did get there eventually.
I had one single request for anyone who told me they were planning to come see the show: Please do not come the first weekend. We were out of rehearsal time, and I hoped very much that we could iron out the kinks that first weekend so that they would be resolved, and the show would be in much better shape from then on. I spent the entire first weekend of the show trying to get my costume changes down and hoping we’d get the dances right.
Before each performance, for a minute or two as the pre-show announcement was being made, we gathered in a circle. Led by Megan, we held hands, took some deep breaths and said a word of two of encouragement. We called it a Hodel huddle.
Our opening night was sold out and the other performances that weekend had nearly sold-out audiences. And each one loved the show, laughing where the laughs were supposed to be. I could not thoroughly enjoy the opening weekend success, however.
Most of my costume changes were finally going smoothly, but there was one that still proved to be a problem, which was when I changed from Jewish villager in “Sabbath Prayer” to Fyedka for the inn scene in “To Life.” Twice that weekend, when I made that change, somehow my Russian shirt ended up on my backwards and that slowed things up. I didn’t understand how that happened. I had it set so I could just slip my head through with it facing the front. In my opinion, we should have just moved the entrance of the Russians and all the lines there to one page later in the script since that costume change was problematic for everyone. Who would know the difference? I was the one who had the lines in the scene when we entered and the only one who managed to make the entrance on time (usually and often only barely); I did the best job I could covering for the others; instead of saying “We’d like a drink,” I said, “My friends behind me and I would like a drink,” or something in that vein. A few times, though very rarely, Oliver managed to make the change in time and join me for that entrance.
By the second weekend, I figured out how to work out that costume change more smoothly, if just a little. In "Sabbath Prayer," Oliver and I would close a curtain behind the main characters while the rest of the cast stood behind it to sing. I had long since decided to just wear the Russian pants and have my upper half be Jewish villager. Originally, I had reservations about doing that since the audience would see me, but I decided maybe they either just wouldn’t notice or they’d forget very quickly. Up top, only the top button of red shirt would be buttoned, the prayer shawl and the Velcro vest over it, holding it together. Then when I got off stage, I’d rip it all off, move the microphone pack to my side and slip the Russian shirt and hat on. It was a bit easier to slip it on and off with only a wife beater undershirt. It allowed me to make the entrance (if only just barely), but only if the elastic sash sewn onto the Russian shirt didn’t get caught in something. Even though the change went a bit more smoothly, I still worried very much about it every performance while we sand "Sabbath Prayer."
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| Final pose for "To Life" |
At one point in the run, Diego (who played the roles of Mendel and Sasha) asked me what my least favorite costume in any show I’ve ever done was. I didn’t think of it then, but wearing leather pants in The Three Musketeers was no fun. In that instance however, I had no other costumes, so they only went on before the show and came off only once, at the end of the show. The Russian shirt however, I hated it. It often got caught as I was putting it on and ripped twice. I thought about asking if I could keep the shirt just so I could rip it to shreds.
After opening weekend, those Covid worries started picking up. Anonymous, who played the innkeeper, tested positive two days after the first Sunday. We had one understudy, Skyler King, and while he was supposed to be Peter’s understudy, he was the only readily available man (Peter was the understudy for Steven, who played Tevye). Based on my experience with Cabaret a year earlier where we had eight people test positive at once including me, I kept nervously checking my emails to see if someone else tested positive and if we’d lose the weekend. We could handle one older cast member (teenaged or hgher) being out, we could handle having one fiddler sick, and, since we had a set of twins alternating a role, one of them as well, but that was it.
Skyler had stepped in as my understudy for two performances during Cabaret, so I knew from personal experience that he’d do well enough to get through the show. Unlike Cabaret however, I couldn’t look after him and help him along during performances; I had my own problems this time around. We had an emergency rehearsal on Wednesday before the second weekend resumed. Even though all the men were requested, only Steven, Max, Diego, Daniel and I came in. We worked with Joe and Celina on all the things Skyler would need to know the best we could.
Given that Skyler would only have two hours of preparation, the scenes he appeared in were kept to a minimum. He did not take part in anything that required choreography, which ruled out “Tradition,” “The Dream,” the wedding dances, “Chava Sequence,” and “Anatevka.” We kept him in “To Life” since the innkeeper had lines in that scene, “Sunset/Sunset” and “The Rumor,” since all he’d have to do is stand there. While the innkeeper had a singing solo in “The Rumor,” Laura Downing-Lee took over that section; Les would tell us that for anyone to cover that part, he trusted her the most to do it. Skyler did manage to do the dance section for “To Life,” since it was simple enough and he seemed comfortable enough with it. He was also kept out of "Sabbath Prayer," butI think he could have easily joined “Sabbath Prayer,” since it was just standing in one spot holding a fake candle. I beleive they kept him out of that song so he could focus on the set change that was after it.
In the meantime, I covered something Anonymous usually did; during “The Dream,” there are three moments in the song where there was a cymbal noise and he would bang two fake wooden cymbals at those parts. Then, at the Thursday performance, we realized we overlooked something: we didn’t realize that Anonymous had a single line in that song. It was glaringly obvious when we had dead air where that line was supposed to be. I quickly took over that line as well, though the following night, the actor who had the next line ran over mine.
Skyler did have to cheat a little. In the scene before “To Life,” I’m almost certain he had the page of script with his lines taped to a piece of the set where the audience couldn’t see, though if he did, I wasn’t paying attention. In the wedding scene, his character had quite a few lines and he read off a piece of paper, but in that instance, since he was basically giving a speech in the scene, he could get away with that.
We all viewed Thursday as an invited understudy practice rehearsal since it was the first one with Skyler and it was not sold out anyway. Skyler did a very good job during that weekend. A number of us congratulated him after the first day and when he finished out the week and some of us were wondering, “Can we keep him?” He got more confident as the weekend went on. By the two Saturday shows, he inserted himself into “Chava Sequence,” since all the cast (excluding me and Peter) just moved hand in hand across the stage. By Sunday, he inserted himself into “Anatevka,” since there wasn’t what you’d call choreography; it was more “move where the scene and music take you,” and interact with the other people as if you’re comforting them.
We had one other small hiccup on Thursday. Courtney, who played the fourth daughter, Shprintze, came into the playhouse feeling a little under the weather so the decision was made to send her home. Luckily, since we had a set of twins alternating the youngest daughter, we simply brought the other one in to cover her. Fortunately, whatever Courtney had was fleeting and returned the following night.
Twice during the run, Lydia had a health scare and had to take a Covid test before a performance. She never tested positive; I think she just had a cold or she was erring on the side of safety. Good thing she didn't get sick because I don't know what we would have done if she had had to step out.
On the Saturday evening performance, somebody in the audience was filming our show and posting it on Snapchat. Not the whole thing, but certain scenes here and there. Big no, no. I’m sure they caught him and stopped him at the second act. The videos he posted stayed up for more than a week, which surprised me; I thought someone would report them for copyright issues.
Aside from the hiccup of two actors being out temporarily, by the second weekend, it was just as I had hoped; other than the costume change from “Sabbath Prayer” to “To Life,” things started moving along much more smoothly. At the Saturday evening performance, a cast-mate from Romeo and Juliet came to the show and afterwards, referring to me closing that show and opening this one in the same week, she said to me “I don’t how you managed to pull it off.” Neither do I. Neither do I.
Anonymous ended up being out longer than expected. In the very early morning of Thursday of the third weekend, when he was supposed to return, his car was vandalized. Very badly. It wasn’t a robbery or anything like that; just some jerk with a bat or pipe or whatever destroying his car just for kicks. Skyler continued on in the role for two more performances. At least if he had to be back again, it was for the same role.
The bottle dance was one of the few times I wished my eyes could handle contact lenses. Jeff (who played Motel the tailor) told me that the audience was always who he looked at when we did that dance and how several of them were transfixed by us. I couldn’t see faces, but I could see people clapping along to the music and I could tell in their body language how invested they were. I would have loved to have seen the looks on their faces clearly.
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| The bottle dance, L to R: Oliver, Diego, Cristian, Daniel, Me |
During the second weekend, the Thursday and Saturday audiences were responsive and laughed a lot. The Friday and Sunday shows were quieter, though the one on Sunday was the more responsive of those two.
The day after we finished out the third weekend (each day of which had packed houses), yet another wrench was thrown in the works. We received a call from the new artistic director of the playhouse. She told us that Cristian, our rabbi, left the production and we would have someone replace him. I didn’t ask what happened or why he left because I felt she probably would not divulge that information. Fortunately, they had someone already in mind to replace him- Jonathen Blue (referred to as Blue by all), the education director of the playhouse. Blue was an experienced actor, singer and choreographer who everyone was confident would step up to the task.
The Wednesday before the fourth weekend began, we had another put in
rehearsal. This time, more of the cast would be called, though not everyone
could make it. Blue had recently finished a show in
On the Thursday performance of that weekend, the performance did not go smoothly. In “To Life,” when all the Jewish men start singing, they missed their cue; no one seemed to want to be the one to start it. Lines were dropped or flubbed and an entire section of the wedding scene dialogue was skipped. The following night, Celina made sure to have the cast run through that scene twice. I had always been glad that I was never in that scene and never had to deal with the mechanics of it- quick paced dialogue, ad-libbing moments of outrage, etc. Not my problem.
The shows for the rest of that weekend went very well and all to sold out houses. The Saturday audience was one of the best we had had up to then in the run. Blue did a very good job in the dances and his scenes. We did have to practice the bottle dance with him just one more time before the show on Thursday, but it went perfectly, considering we still never practiced in front of a mirror.
After the show on Sunday, we had a little cast party at
In the days leading up to the closing weekend, I put out the word on my social media, telling people the weekend was already nearly sold out and that they had better think about getting tickets. And the closing weekend sold very fast. Here’s how fast I mean- On Sunday of the weekend before that I started counting how many seats remained and there were 142 seats among the remaining four performances combined. On Monday there were between 90-100 seats left. The Sunday performance was sold out by Tuesday and that day started with just under 85 seats left for the other three performances combined. By the end of the day on Tuesday there were 42 seats left. By very early Wednesday morning, there were 33 seats left. By the end of that day there were only 16 seats left and the Saturday evening show was sold out. Two more seats were gone by Thursday, but by then it started leveling out by the Friday show, there were only 8 seats left.
In spite of audience selling out, there were often empty seats that were noticeable. There were various reasons: something came up and people couldn’t make it after all, season subscribers bought tickets because they had to, but didn’t make it or, on Sundays, retirement homes would buy blocks of tickets, but not be able to bring enough people in the end. Without my glasses I couldn’t see details like people’s faces, but I could make out bodies and where there weren’t any. Still, the houses were still packed full and there were only a few empty seats that were easily forgettable as the show went on.
The audiences were also very complimentary and gushing over our show. A number of them said it was the best production they’d ever seen of this musical, even more than the touring production that had been around earlier that year. I didn’t buy that. I’m guessing they had very short memories and were just overwhelmed in the moment. Still, it was nice to hear.
Two incidents at my work made me worry whether I’d be able to do my dancing in the show for the final weekend. On Monday when walking out of a room, I turned too soon and bumped my knee on the doorframe. That wasn’t a big deal, but it was sore for nearly two days. Then on Wednesday I was moving between two heavy pieces of metal equipment and bumped the same knee in a different spot. Hard. It really hurt for days afterward. Even by Sunday it was still a bit sore if I pushed down on it.
Friday of closing weekend had one of our better audiences, though an almost empty second row of seats was conspicuous. I worried we’d have a repeat of the first performance of the previous weekend since we had just had four days off, but it went off without a hitch. On Saturday it was the second time we had two shows in a day. Both audiences were good that day, even the matinee one, surprisingly. While that one was lively enough, the evening one cheered and applauded raucously after every song. The audience on Sunday was the quietest audience that weekend, but not by much.
Closing day was emotional for a few people. Laura Davies (who played Yente the matchmaker) presented Steve with a little musical figurine of Tevye autographed by the entire cast. Megan cried openly backstage after finishing her song “Far From the Home I Love.” Even during that scene, she was choking up and working hard to get through it. I myself almost cried more than once, but I had to force myself not to. The first was before the show started while we were in our huddle and the second was while I waited offstage for my set change after "Far from the Home I Love." In both instances, I had to go on soon and I worried if I lost my composure, I wouldn't be able to pull myself together again.
I was not feeling sadness over the show ending; of all the shows I did that year, this one was probably my least favorite because it was the most problematic and nerve-wracking. Rather, I almost cried from happiness that I achieved my goal of doing four shows in a year and not a single one had a cancelled performance due to Covid. That alone was a remarkable feat in itself. There were one or two close calls during the run of this show, but every performance went ahead. It was also a joy to play to packed houses at every performance of Fiddler, regardless of whether every seat was full or not.
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| Curtain Call, final performance |
With four shows behind me in 2023, I was done performing for the year. I could only hope that the following year would be just as busy and fulfilling.
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