The first realization I made after taking my seat was one that is normally missed by viewers seeing the performance in their native language: Members of a shtetl are speaking modern Hebrew! Wait, is it even normal for them to speak English? Of course not. That said, when Perchik the socialist entered, he spoke the language of the "old country," and perfectly, I might add, but the reality is that he was detached from the values and traditions that were core to the residents of the town. On another note, the non-Jewish village folk spoke perfect Hebrew as well, with slight Russian accents. How ironic that a story about persecution of an insular society is now presented in a variation of that insular language! Also, on this night, there were Russian subtitles presented for the entire show. While all set pieces and curtains had Hebrew Biblical verses, the train station where the "Far From the Home I Love" song takes place was rested under a large slab, "AHATEBKE."
On a final note about the Hebrew, the script was very directly translated from the English, however Tevya's (rather Tuvia's, the only character in the play who's name was adapted from the Yiddish) Biblical citations provided for new puns and plays on verses that resonated well with the audience.
Now the deeper questions that arose to me from this performance: An overwhelmingly secular yet uniquely established "Jewish" city, Tel-Aviv, presented a story about an isolated community facing threats of assimilation through new traditions and violence. This made me consider for a long time the fascinating reality of what took place tonight. Was it paradoxical, that a city can live secularly and yet still embrace and appreciate the traditions that had since dissolved from their lifestyle? How many of the cast members were really religious? What did the audience think of the activities of Tuvia's daughters? Even with Chavah, the one who elopes with a Russian, in her first confrontation following the affair, a light chuckle circulated through the crowd.
Diaspora Jews, especially in North America, are grappling daily with their positions and their affiliated movement's positions of topics like intermarriage. In Israel, this is not so much the case (unless you want to consider a Tunisian Jew and a Roman Jew marrying, and what kind of melodies they would sing on holidays). Here the challenge is acceptance and tolerance, since the gap between religious and secular continues to grow here, not to mention the reality that non-Jews exist here and are so often ignored. The viewer can watch Fiddler and leave feeling pity for the shtetl that suffered for no reason. He/She can feel empowered to maintain the traditions that are now challenged by a growing secular society. But he/she can also watch the play, and as with so many history books, conclude that this was how Jews once sought to protect their identity. The question then becomes, how does this story speak to us today? Is the modern challenge even to find balance in the practices of old, while these practices depreciate in value? The language has certainly changed.
Perhaps as most symbolic a response to this problem, and this show, the fiddler himself, a representation of a world always on the brink of chaos, balancing on what it believes- traditions and the centrality of a home- was played by a character in full white costume, wearing a sports coat with waving tails, and capped with a white skullcap, who danced around the stage. He did not appear to be from the same dimension as the members of the shtetl. Perhaps he was their imagined and ideal figure, a fiddler untainted and unrestricted in his ability to bring music to the world. Perhaps he was a messianic glimpse. I think, though, that he was playing off of the contemporary shtetl, the Israeli one, and the tug between the strings of his traditional instrument, whether they're played or not, heard or not, or even known.
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