Chicago Tribune - Highly Recommended
"...Director Barrie Kosky's breathtaking Lyric Opera staging of "Fiddler on the Roof" hit me with such an unexpected flood of emotion on Saturday night, I've rewritten this first paragraph numerous times. How best to persuade you to go?"
Chicago Sun Times - Highly Recommended
"..."Fiddler on the Roof" is an innately and wonderfully Jewish story, but its exploration of tradition and ritual vs. modernity and change and its themes of family life and everyday survival are universal and cut across ethnic cultures and national boundaries."
Chicago Reader - Highly Recommended
"...Kosky has made changes, but his Fiddler is a deeply appreciative, even (where it matters) traditional, take on this musical theater masterpiece. With designer Rufus Didwiszus, he's replaced the shtetl image (originally inspired, as was the show's title and central metaphor, by the art of Marc Chagall) with a solution that also speaks to the problem of how to make a musical theater piece work in a vast opera house. Their strategy: pare the sets down to a single symbol. Then pack the stage with live bodies and ramp up the energy."
Chicago On the Aisle - Highly Recommended
"...Otto Pichler’s terrific dance numbers (revived for Lyric by Silvano Marraffa) put one in mind of the electric abandon that energized the Grambling step dance scene at Lyric in last season’s “Fire Shut Up in My Bones.” This time, the priceless number is a deliriously over the top bottle dance starring a riotously leaping band of wedding revelers. I for one would have been happy to watch them do it all over again."
Chicago Stage and Screen - Highly Recommended
"...Everything about this production does justice to its roots and expresses the DNA of the story and how it reaches into the now– the area in which this story is set is today a battlefield, and refugees are once again fleeing part of the area that was the Pale. This is a story our children must see. Kosky has chosen to make this an epic– there are many moments when the entire village is on stage and so sacrifices the very personal aspects of the struggle, making personal choices seem more iconic than they must have been for the people who wrestled with making them, but this is a Fiddler for the ages. Don’t miss it. I personally would see it twice."
Around The Town Chicago - Recommended
"...My biggest problem with being in the audience for a performance is my wanting to sing some of the songs. I feel that the one positive thing from the pandemic is wearing the mask during a performance of any play that I did “once upon a time”- it muffles my singing along! Having a Broadway musical on the stage of the Lyric is always a treat and seeing “Fiddler” on their stage is a gift!"
WTTW - Recommended
"...While there are many scenes of both immense emotion and rich comedy, the overall grandiosity of this production at times seems in contradiction to the actual roots of the work — a tale that unfolds in Anatevka, a Jewish shtetl in the Pale of Settlement of Imperial Russia, circa 1905."
Rescripted - Somewhat Recommended
"...To me, however, though the parts are at times beautifully assembled, the whole does not cohere into a cogent statement that expands upon the themes of Fiddler on the Roof. This show’s observations as a piece of historical fiction have only grown more urgent over the last six decades. Its haunting, tragic portrayal of intergenerational trauma has earned much rightful praise, but what struck me most on this viewing was its commentary on police brutality, and the state’s reasons for enacting it. Once again, however, the changes to the Constable’s arc have in my opinion robbed this theme of its teeth. I look forward to a future production of Fiddler that not only captures its magic and joy as this did, but is also able to delve deeply into its darkest corners with precision, and come out with a meaningful message that we can all act upon."
The Fourth Walsh - Highly Recommended
"...Director Barrie Kosky masterfully navigates between the old/new, drama/comedy and complexity/simplicity. In a contemporary spin, he uses a fifth grader, Drake Wunderlich, as the fiddler. The show starts with the young boy, in headphones and hoodie, opening an ancient wardrobe and finding a violin among the coats and suitcase remnants. As Wunderlich begins to play so beautifully, the door -literally- opens to the past and the very large cast spills out."
Third Coast Review - Highly Recommended
"...The captivating genius of this thrilling beginning runs right through the entire production. Kosky’s hypnotizing vision restages familiar wonders into fresh astonishments: Jerome Robbin’s famous bottle dance … the crazy Walpurgisnacht of Tevye’s dream … the riotous celebration of To Life (L’Chaim) … every number surprises and captivates."
Chicago Theater and Arts - Recommended
"...Lyric’s production, directed by Barrie Kosky, definitely takes advantage of an operatic stage with its large chorus of villagers, remarkable dancers, its many main cast members and enough other actors to fill the shtetl of Anatevka in the Pale of Settlement in Imperial Russia."
Picture This Post - Recommended
"...The Lyric Opera’s production of Fiddler on the Roof transpires almost entirely at ground level. From this solid horizontal, the Jews of Anatevka appeal to the Almighty for help with all that disrupts the orderly flow of life."
