‘Fiddler on the Roof’ Reflects Universal Themes Applicable to Our Troubled Times

For most of my life, I have considered that the Broadway musical “Fiddler on the Roof,” which was transformed into a motion picture, captured not only the realities and conditions within a small Jewish village amidst the uncertainty and turmoil of the Russian monarchy and hostile Russian gentile citizenry, but that it also captured several universal themes of the larger human condition regardless of background or location.

These themes include issue of family, traditions, identity, faith, love, charity, community, enmity, fear, repression, joy, loss, intergenerational continuance and change, migration, connection and separation, hopes and dreams, resignation, and the precariousness of life and the tenuous illusion of control and balance just like “a fiddler on the roof.”

Each of the songs and production numbers advance the plot as well as the universal topics they represent.

The opening number, “Tradition,” highlights the importance of the village of Anatevka and its residents’ Jewish traditions, which act like the glue connecting the people to one another and to their established customs.

Anatevka is a fictional village within Imperial Russia at the turn of the last century in what was known as the “Pale of Settlement,” a region where Ashkenazi Jews were once permitted to live. Today, this region is situated in what is Ukraine. The music and story are based on Sholom Aleichem’s “Tevye and his Daughters.”

Through the younger generation, we understand that these traditions have not been static but, rather, have continually evolved and progressed as they introduce new ideas to their elders and are introduced to new ideas by those who are newcomers to the village. And we see the resistance by the older generations to the changes taking place around them as they strive to maintain some semblance of the old ways.

The United States, for example, can be seen as a larger more expansive version of the village of Anatevka as young citizens and immigrants from other lands have aided the nation in progressing and moving forever forward to ultimately become a leader of innovation and in protecting the rights of all its residents, though still evolving to create a “more perfect union.”

The song “Matchmaker, Matchmaker,” reveals the young people’s hopes, dreams, and anxieties about marriage, and I would venture that this number also reflects their feelings about their futures generally. Like our current times, they lived in a changing world, a tenuous landscape of known and unknown pleasures as well as challenges and threats. And as some of their hopes became unmet and conditions around them changed, they had to alter their dreams and their goals.

“If I Were a Rich Man” represents the main character, Tevye the dairyman’s, longing for a better life for himself and his family, the attainment of the equivalent of “The American Dream” within the stark Russian Pale of Settlement. The song represents the dreams of people across the globe for a better, safer, more productive life for those who may feel powerless over the conditions surrounding their lives.

The number, “To Life” (L’Chaim) represents celebration and the larger possibility and actuality of bringing together in unity and friendship, albeit temporarily, feuding and warring sides, Jews and their Russian Christian neighbors. It signals a chance for peace and reconciliation in a world of division.

In a strikingly divided nation like the United States where unity appears unattainable, possibly this scene of culturally, religiously, and politically disparate neighbors coming together can inspire us to at least begin to see one another as possible allies one day.

“Miracle of Miracles,” while celebrating Motel’s joy of marrying his true love, can be understood as anyone whose dream has become realized: from achieving a goal in life to electing your candidate of choice for office, to relocating to a place that provides more security for yourself and your family, to watching and acting to bring about the downfall of a tyrannical leader or entire regime. Yes, this is certainly applicable to our current moment in history.

I believe that “Sunrise, Sunset” was composed to capture the universal bittersweet emotions of witnessing intergenerational growth and change, and the ways the generations navigate those continual and unalterable changes. It also reflects the larger societal changes that one is unable to alter or change as we attempt to balance ourselves upon the roof.

“Do You Love Me?” explores not only the complex nature of intimate love and relationships, but also asks us questions about self-love and self-worth, of whether we make a difference in the lives of others and in the world, and of whether we are achieving our life’s goals. The song asks us the larger question of what our purpose in life is.

“Far From the Home I Love,” expresses Hodel’s passionate departure from her beloved family and home and her excitement over joining her Perchik in Siberia. It can be understood more generally as the excitement and anxiety of anyone who enters a new chapter in life whether moving to a new place or new position, entering into a new relationship, or embracing a new space emotionally.

And the final song about “Anatevka” expresses the people’s feelings of being uprooted and their fears of being forced to migrate from their home to places foreign and unknown. So why would they wish to remain in this rather shabby and poor town when they barely maintained enough to survive from day to day and year to year?

While poor, their little Anatevka provided its residents with a certain richness emotionally and culturally. People are connected through the hardships of their lives by their cultural and religious traditions and their love for one another.

Maybe the example of Anatevka can explain why others who have been forced to migrate from their beloved homes by tyrannical regimes, by climate change, by wars, by famine, would have rather remained in their homes and communities. While poor, their homelands also provided its residents with a certain richness emotionally and culturally.

And maybe the story of “Fiddler on the Roof” can restore the empathy many have lost for the brave migrants throughout the world who are attempting to find a better and safer life for themselves and their loved ones.

Possibly the leaders and residents specifically of the United States, Europe, Russia, and Israel understand the analogy of “Fiddler on the Room” as a testament for our times, and the hopes of rekindling empathy leading to peaceful means of embracing our similarities and our differences and in welcoming new immigrants to our shores.

Maybe we will one day embrace the statement that “Nobody Is Illegal.”