Best Group Effort
The next song "Matchmaker,
Matchmaker" was extremely well
done and perhaps the easiest song
to hear throughout the whole
evening. It related the situation in
the village where all marriages were
contracted through an official
matchmaker and the girls had no
choice in the matter at all. A
parody of arranged marriages, it
was very amusing and sung by the
three oldest daughters, Tzeitel,
Hodel and Chava, one of the best
group efforts.
This reporter felt initially that
the song "If I Were a Rich Man"
sung by Tevye (in a wistful desire
to also be cursed with a small
fortune,) was played down and not
enough emotion was pulled from
the audience. It was felt that a song
with so much potential should not
be sung whilst reclining in a milk
wagon.
However, in contrast to the
production in London, the Prince
of Wales Theatre on Haymarket,
staring Topol, where he was able to
strut in front of a packed audience
absolutely belting the song out at
the top of his lungs and pull the
audience into his grasp emotionally,
Mr. Cusanelli realized that due to
the cavernous qualities of University
Hall and the obvious impossibility
of ever charging the entire
building with electric feelings of
emotion or even of ever filling it
with sound, it would be also
impossible to attempt the more
emphatic approach. Instead he
interpreted the song in a lackadaisical
manner which proved to be
really the most effective way of
putting across the song in such a
building.
In certain other cases though it
was felt that the less violently
active approach was not as effective.
How much more effective
would it not have been had the men
from town been far more choppy,
abrupt, and snappy in the scene
where they are cursing the Czar and
replying with 'Amens' and group
expectorations rather than the slow
and emphatic presentation given
us.
