By Marci Shatzman
Trying for 10 years for the rights to stage “Fiddler on the Roof” turned out to be worth the wait for Boca’s Wick Theatre & Costume Museum.
The Wick’s production of “Fiddler” got a 10 from Enyde Polesuk, among locals who saw the Broadway revival with Zero Mostel, reprising his original Tevye role.
“The singers, the dancers, I loved every minute,” she said during intermission. Her reaction was typical.
The audience for “Fiddler,” at the Wick through Feb. 11, could hardly stay in their seats after every song in the familiar score at the Jan. 12 show.
At the end, they gave a shouting standing ovation to the 32-member cast, and especially “Tevye,” experienced “Fiddler” and Broadway performer Bruce Sabath. Theater owner and executive producer Marilynn Wick accepted congrats and kudos in the lobby afterward.
The plot of the long-running Broadway musical explores the end of a father’s right to make all decisions, including arranging their children’s marriages, i.e. the show’s opening number “Tradition.” The story is told through Tevye the milk man’s family with five daughters, as he appeals directly to God and the audience for intervention. The finale shows how the Tzar’s edict forced Jews to abandon their villages as pogroms, attacks against them intensified.
The Wick’s production has eight professional union Actors Equity members in the cast, and Wick regulars in major roles. Among them are Patti Gardner as Tevye’s wife Golde, and daughters Mallory Newbrough as Hodel and Ellie Rose Pulsifer as Sphrintze, just back from her national tour as “Annie.” Returning actor Michael Scott Ross plays Motel. “Fiddler” is the Wick’s third Broadway musical in their 10th theatrical season. Up next are “Carousel” from Feb. 29 through March 24 and “The Buddy Holly Story” from April 11 through May 5.