Guildhall School of Music & Drama – Fiddler On the Roof

Alex James-Cox and Harry Harrington in Guildhall School of Music & Drama’s Fiddler On the Roof at the Silk Street Theatre, London. Picture: Clive Barda

Fiddler On the Roof, presented by students from the Guildhall School of Music & Drama, continues at the Silk Street Theatre, London, until 11 July 2018.

Star rating: five stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

The high quality of student productions continues to amaze and Guildhall final-year graduates do full justice to Fiddler On the Roof, the 1964 smash hit that ran eight years on Broadway and for 2,030 performances when it rolled into the West End in 1967.

The much-loved story of philosopher-milkman Tevye’s vain attempt to preserve tradition in a changing world as his three elder daughters – he has five – defy him to marry for love rather than security still resonates today.
We are in the Jewish village of Anatevka in 1905 on the eve of the Russian Revolution. Tevye has to pull his milk cart himself because his horse is sick and he has no money for a replacement.

He doesn’t want his daughters to be as poor as he is so enlists a matchmaker Yente (Poppy Allen-Quarmby) who has “arranged” more financially suitable partners, like the widowed butcher who is Tevye’s age, but the stubborn girls aren’t having it.

Tzeitel (Phoebe Marshall), the eldest, marries a potless tailor, Hodel (Rosalind Lailey) falls for a young revolutionary being sent to Siberia and Chava (Tegen Short), horror of horrors, wants to marry outside the faith.

In the end, under demand of the Russians, they have to leave their beloved Anatevka, most of them heading for a new life in America.

Guildhall’s annual musical is right up to the standard of Grand Hotel and Crazy For You, the last two shows I reviewed there, and in Alex James-Cox’s whole-hearted interpretation of Tevye we see something special.

The well-made-up James-Cox, winner of the Lionel Bart Foundation Scholarship, gets right to the heart of the part, even down to the authentic elderly man’s shuffle. His hand movements for ‘If I Were a Rich Man’ are amusingly brilliant and the singing voice a pleasure to listen to. Remember the name.

Director Martin Connor, a Guildhall regular, has teased fine performances from the supporting cast in a monumental team effort. Tevye’s dream sequence (or was it nightmare?) with the ghost of Grandma Tzeitel to the fore, is superbly achieved.

The Klezmer band of four – fiddle, clarinet, accordion and flute – make beautiful music and an orchestra of 28 under MD Steven Edis pulls out all the stops to bring the Jerry Bock/Sheldon Harnick score (book by Joseph Stein) to life.

‘Rich Man’ apart, there are some great musical moments like the perfect opening scene-setter ‘Tradition’, ‘Matchmaker’, the boisterous ‘To Life’, and ‘Sunrise, Sunset’.

But it is the ‘Do You Love Me?’ duet between Tevye and his long-suffering better half Golde (Tallulah Bond, excellent) that stirs the heart most, this middle-aged man’s nostalgic reflections on his own marriage on observing the total adoration between Hodel and her man Perchik in ‘Now I Have Everything’.

Three smaller male performances merit a mention, Finlay Paul as Motel, the tailor excited by getting a new sewing machine, Raphael Eilenberg’s gormless Rabbi and Harry Harrington’s rich butcher. They provide much of the evening’s humour.

Tim Lutkin’s lighting is clever, I loved Adam Wiltshire’s set and Joanna Goodwin’s choreography produces some genuinely thrilling and well-drilled ensemble work. Strong in every department, Guildhall’s team never wavers from the highest standards and the only quibble is with the length of Act I, the best part of 90 minutes, which either needs speeding up or trimming.

Jeremy Chapman