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NOWhen I was a kid, I watched Fiddler on the Roof with my family. Probably on PBS because back then our family only had four channels on a small, black and white TV. Later my grandmother bought a new TV and gave us her old color one. My brother may have bought this movie on VHS or somehow we acquired one and I watched it often because I loved the music so much.
I sobbed at the ending and still do.
My favorite song in the movie was this one, “If I Were A Rich Man.” I danced around the living room singing it and do all the motions. I was probably 10 or 11. My family thought I was hilarious and my mom wondered about putting me in plays, but I was much too shy. I still am. Plus I didn’t really have talent, just a love of music and Chaim Topol’s performance.
Chaim Topol was an Israeli actor who portrayed Tevye both on stage and in the 1971 movie. He went by the name Topol professionally.
Chaim didn’t know a lot of English when he auditioned for Tevye. According to Topol knew little English when auditioning for Tevye. According to the Denver Center for the Performing Arts, he had learned the songs phonetically from the Fiddler Broadway cast album. He later was tutored by the Royal Shakespeare Company’s voice coach Cicely Berry and first played Tevye in Fiddler’s 1967 London premiere.
Chaim was in his late 20s when he first started playing the role but he could walk like and old man and the producers liked that.
Topol once estimated that he played his iconic character 3,500 times. He appeared in numerous London Fiddler productions and toured the U.S., Europe, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand from the 80s to the late 2000s with his final performance in Boston, Massachusetts on November 15, 2009.
He passed away in 2023, leaving behind his wife, two daughters, and nine grandchildren.
* thank you to the person who pointed out I typed too fast here and on the reel - the name is Tevye! Eeek! I had it spelled right some places in the caption and other places not. 🤦♀️🤦♀️**
#fiddlerontheroof #topol #oldmovies
@nostalgically_thinking
