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Entries in Fiddler on the Roof (5)

Wednesday
Sep042019

Doc Corner: 'Fiddler: A Miracle of Miracles'

By Glenn Dunks

Music documentaries are a dime-a-dozen these days, and musicals have been a Hollywood staple for as long as there has been sound to go alongside the flickering images of movies. But it hadn’t really dawned on me until I watched Max Lewkowicz’s Fiddler: A Miracle of Miracles that documentaries about Broadway shows are surprisingly rare.

Among this rare subgenre The Best Worst Thing That Ever Could Have Happened will probably find a lasting cultural place thanks to Richard Linklaker’s latest long-form cinematic folly of Merrily We Roll Along. It's a surprise that Show Business: The Road to Broadway has not already become a staple thanks to its amazing line-up of big Broadway hitters. There are also shows like  Every Little Step, The Heat is On: The Making of Miss Saigon and Life After Tomorrow, which offer a glimpse back stage to what it is like to put on a Broadway show. But I can’t actually recall a documentary that took a single show like Lewkowicz does with Fiddler on The Roof and examine it all the way from its inception through to its lasting legacy. Perhaps it will inspire some more – I certainly hope so, for A Miracle of Miracles is a delight of a documentary that educated me and made me into a bigger fan of the show...

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Monday
Nov052018

Showbiz: Norma's Win, Gwyneth's Breakthrough, and Sam Rockwell's 50th

10 random things that happened on this day (Nov 5th) in showbiz history...

1930 The 3rd annual Academy Awards are held for films released between August 1, 1929, and July 31, 1930... they hadn't yet settled on the easier full calender year system. The anti-war masterpiece All Quiet on the Western Front took Best Picture and Norma Shearer, the First Lady of MGM, won Best Actress for scandalous pre-code classic The Divorcée (which you really should see).

1935 Parker Brothers launches board game classic "Monopoly". Remember when Ridley Scott was going to do a movie version? That was so weird...

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Friday
Aug282015

TV @ The Movies: "Difficult People" and the Golden Globes of Hate

NEW SERIES! Since our eyes always flash and a smile spreads when a movie is referenced on a tv show we're watching, we've decided to make it a habit to share these cross-platform romances with you. Whenever we see one worth discussing, we'll share it.


Have you been watching Hulu's Difficult People? You should be watching Difficult People! Admittedly, it could be a very hard show to fall in love with if you’re not a fan of watching terrible New Yorkers act like exclusionary, entitled gits while spouting cruel insults about celebrities – but hey, that’s one of my favourite genres! What it does mean is references galore, like an audition for a remake of the 1988 body swap comedy Vice Versa in episode two, or a PBS roast in episode three that finds time for jokes about Shining Time Station (“If there’s one thing children love, it’s having Ringo Starr yell at them about trains”) and Maggie Smith’s genitals being named after Mr. Bean.

Julie Klausner and Billy Eichner star as Julie and Billy. They are less successful, but very pseudo-autobiographical versions of themselves - a mildly successful recapper of reality television and a waiter trying to be an actor respectively. They are trying to build a career in comedy while he works for Gabby Sidibe and she deals with her psychiatrist mother (Andrea Martin). Their love of pop culture knows no meta-bounds and they show has already landed in hot water over a joke in episode one about Beyonce that was the target of people who apparently know nothing of irony, criticising the show, the network, Klausner, and executive producer Amy Poehler as “disgusting”.

Sigh, right? [More...]

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Monday
Sep222014

Fiddler on the Roof is 50

Fifty years ago today, Fiddler on the Roof opened on Broadway and was an instant success with audiences and also won 9 Tony Awards including the big kahuna Best Musical. It would become the longest running musical in Broadway history until it was surpassed by that crop of 80s mega-musicals from Britain. The musical has been performed countless times since in stage productions all over the world and four revivals on Broadway (76, 81, 90, 04). 

Best Actor nominee Topol in "Fiddler on the Roof" (1971)

By 1971 there was a movie adaptation that was nominated for 8 Oscars including Best Picture and I don't believe we've ever discussed it. That ain't right. I've been thinking about 60s and 70s musicals a lot recently due to that book "Roadshow!" and while the movie studios were definitely overinvested in the genre after the gargantuan back-to-back mega hits that were Mary Poppins and Sound of Music occassionally a hit would crop up within the string of flops that killed the genre thereafter. It helped that Norman Jewison was helming. As "Roadshow!" recounts:

I've never seen a distributor, an exhibitor... or the head of a studio ever improve on a film," said Jewison, "Only creative people can improve on a film." Cinematographer Oswald Morris said, "Norman was under hideous pressure from United Artists to keep costs down. To give him his due, he withstood all this; he had a vision for Fiddler, which he wasn't prepared to compromise, no matter what the front office said, and I greatly admire him for this." Jewison immersed himself in classic Jewish culture. I think he knows more about Judaism today than I do," said Topol. Fiddler lyricist Sheldon Harnick noted that Jewison, "isn't Jewish, but he did so much research in preparation for the film that he became quite knowledgeable about things Jewish. As a result, either Topol, or someone else suggested that he should be made an honorary Jew and renamed Norman Christianson!"

When signed, Jewison was hot off the double Oscar success of The Russians Are Coming! The Russians Are Coming! (1966) and In the Heat of the Night (1967) with his best work still far in the future; That's Moonstruck (1987) -- you know this to be true!

Critical reactions to Fiddler varied and some people objected to its relentless downplaying (within the marketing) of the Judaism of the story, but it raked in big bucks. Or as "Roadshow!" puts it: 

Roughly half of "The Sound of Music"'s earnings, but half of "Music" still qualifies as a blockbuster.

My last visit with this property was not the movie but the stage show's gorgeous 2004 revival starring Alfred Molina (the set design and lighting were just exquisite stage triumphs but it weirdly won no Tonys despite plentiful nominations) and I was stunned to realize or, rather, remember that virtually every song is a classic. It's one of those musicals.

What's your favorite number in that show and do you like its film version?

Friday
Nov222013

Happy 98th to a Great Cinematographer!

Let's sing a big raucous happy birthday to 98 years young Oscar winner Oswald Morris who is still with us! That's a lot of candles. And a lot of great movies.

The British born Morris only ever received Oscar nominations for big screen musicals (Oliver!, Fiddler on the Roof , and The Wiz) but that's hardly the full picture of his career. Though reknowned for his use of color -- his cinematography on Moulin Rouge (1952, recently discussed) was particularly innovative -- he also won prizes for his black and white work, most notably: Moby Dick, The Pumpkin Eater, The Hill, and The Spy Who Came in From the Cold. Other well known pictures include EquusThe Guns of Navarone, Stanley Kubrick's Lolita and a couple of Liz & Dick adventures (The Taming of the Shrew and Reflections in a Golden Eye). His awards haul includes 1 Oscar, 3 BAFTAs, 3 British Society of Cinematography wins and a couple of career tribute trophies.

Curiously or too-cutely, you decide, his last two motion pictures were all about puppets. He retired after The Great Muppet Caper (1981) and The Dark Crystal (1982) thirty-some years ago. We hope he's still enjoying that good long retirement. 

The Dark Crystal was Morris's last gig before retirememt
The Pumpkin Eater with Anne Bancroft
Oswald (far left) with Deborah Kerr & Robert Mitchum on the set of "Heaven Knows Mr Allison"