Not How It Seems: ‘Fiddler on the Roof’
We’ve recently discussed The Happiest Millionaire in which a man deals with an ever-changing world and “losing” his daughter to marriage, and then Oliver, which deals with poverty. I thought this would be a great time to discuss Fiddler on the Roof, which deals with both.
Although it’s based on stories that date back to 1894, set in 1905, and was released in 1971, Fiddler on the Roof is essentially a film about the changing social structures of the Sixties. What do I mean? I shall explain.
In the early Sixties, the baby boomer generation was just beginning to come of age. But by the mid-to-late part of the decade, a good portion of them knew what they wanted and were ready to fight for it. The nuclear family was gradually breaking apart, and some of the former heads of household were beginning to take it badly, grasping on to any power they could.
Tevye, the lead character in Fiddler on the Roof, becomes something of an example of how the older generation should deal with changes in society. The village of Anatevka is small, but balanced by their Jewish traditions (or so Tevye says). They must do things a certain way, as they have always been done, lest their lives “be as shaky as a fiddler on the roof.”
Now, of course, this all-important “tradition” becomes threatened almost immediately. Their lives are already as shaky as a fiddler on the roof, but they’re afraid of change, just as the patriarchs in the Sixties feared change. Meanwhile, the younger generation is already questioning the status quo, as evidenced in “Matchmaker.”
They’re beginning to realize that the traditions can actually ruin their chances of happiness. Their generation wants different things from their parents.
Following up on that, we learn that the eldest daughter, Tzeitel, doesn’t want a match arranged for her because she’s already found her own match in the timid tailor, Motel. Tradition doesn’t forbid her from marrying him, but he must first get Tevye’s approval, and not only does Tzeitel’s mother hope for a wealthy man for her, but Motel is too shy to ask Tevye until Tevye has already arranged a marriage for Tzeitel with the rich, but very old, widower butcher. In something of an act of rebellion, Tzeitel refuses to marry the butcher and asks that she be allowed to marry Motel. She reveals that she and Motel have pledged to one another that they should be married.
So, despite his constant wails of “tradition,” Tevye decides that his daughter’s happiness is more important than the tradition that marriages must be arranged by the papa. Motel is a good, hardworking man, so Tevye decides to allow the union to occur with his blessing.
Tevye and his wife, Golde, ponder the generation gap at the wedding, wondering where time has gone, how they can continue to help their children, and realizing that they (and by extension, their generation) are now in each other’s hands.
Meanwhile, trouble has been brewing in the village. The Russian militia is expected to give a demonstration of their authority by trashing the Jewish part of the town. They do so at the wedding, proving for the first time that fate is sometimes completely out of the hands of tradition and not the fault of either generation.
Another thing that’s been brewing is the romance between Tevye’s second oldest daughter Hodel and a radical Marxist named Perchik. When Perchik announces that he plans to leave town to do more revolutionary work, he and Hodel decide that they too shall become engaged. As very radical thinkers, Perchik and Hodel don’t even feel they need Tevye’s permission as Tzeitel and Motel did, but as a matter of respect, they ask for his blessing.
Despite this action being even further removed from the traditions Tevye holds dear, he once again offers his permission, although he can clearly feel his power dwindling in this society, as tradition falls to the wayside. Hodel ends up travelling to Siberia to be with Perchik, leaving her home and family for something she feels is more important.
Yet another problem for Tevye comes in the form of his third daughter, Chava. She falls in love with a bookish Russian named Fyedka, who is an Orthodox Christian. This, Tevye cannot allow. He forbids Chava from seeing Fyedka again, which causes her to completely rebel and get married in a Christian church. When Tevye finds out, he decides to disown Chava, feeling that “if I try and bend that far, I’ll break.”
But there are bigger fish to fry than Chava marrying outside of their religion. Soon, all the Jews in Anatevka are told that they must leave town in three days and find an entirely new place to live. And so Tevya and his remaining family must leave behind the place they’ve lived all of their lives, leaving behind the traditions that can’t be taken with them. And of course, these changes can’t be helped. Some changes came without anyone politely requesting.
In the end, Tevye grudgingly accepts what has happened with Chava, even giving her a blessing in a roundabout way. As he leaves town, Tevye catches sight of the old fiddler from the rooftops and realizes that life will go on, and even some traditions will go on without every single tradition remaining the same.
“You Can’t Always Get What You Want” was released by the Rolling Stones in 1969 and addressed three major topics of the Sixties in each verse; love, politics, and drugs. Likewise, Fiddler on the Roof takes on three major topics of the Sixties, one with each of Tevye’s eldest daughters. The topics presented here though are love, politics, and religion. Each daughter represents one of these challenges to the traditional ideals. First, Tzeitel falls for Motel, who isn’t quite what her parents would have hoped for in a suitor, but they grudgingly allow her to marry someone they don’t quite approve of, even though there was some going behind their back involved. Then Hodel falls for Perchik, a revolutionary, a “hippie” in this metaphor. He’s involved in protests, and definitely not what they might want for their daughter, but they allow the relationship to unfold. Lastly, religion becomes the subject, and this is the hardest thing for Tevye to wrap his head around. But with the influx of Eastern religions and youth rebelling, abandoning your parents’ faith wasn’t uncommon in the 1960s.
Tevye, of course, takes all of these changes slightly unwillingly, but with a mostly open heart, probably the way the boomer generation wished their parents would take their choices. In the end, it’s almost like Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young are singing right into Tevye’s ear, recommending that he teach his daughters well, feed them on his dreams, but never ask them why.
“Not How It Seems” (usually) attempts to support the argument that favorite movie musicals aren’t really the dated, anti-feminist films some people perceive them to be.
