STEMPENYU BY SHALOM ALEICHEM - AT THE ADC
What did the fiddler do before he sat on the roof? That is the basis of ‘Stempenyu’ a play by the Yiddish writer Shalom Aleichem. Brought to the ADC by a student troupe, the drama is the first translation of the original written in 1913. It was a feast of klezmer, circle dancing and fine singing: but does it work as a play?
The show opened with a fine band playing their hearts out on clarinet, accordian, strings and percussion. It gave the old theatre a real party atmosphere and it was hard not to get up and have a Yiddisher bop. Next we meet our sometime narrator, Shalom Aleichem himself (Adam Kalechman) who addresses his ‘grandfather’ and offers the play to him in homage. The story then gets going at a rapid pace with a village full of nebbish men (wearing prayer shawls) and feisty women. The text is delivered, not always clearly, mostly in English but with large dollops of Yiddish to give, I guess, authentic context. The narrative is often punctuated by the klezmer band led by the eponymous Stempenyu. He is a consummate fiddler both of the violin and in the lives of the village women. A kind of puckish Pied Piper leading the ladies away from their ultra-traditional Jewish world. We are of course, in the world of Anatevka and those who love ‘Fiddler of the Roof’ (based on Aleichem’s stories) will know what I mean. Chanya Ambalu plays the fiddler with innocent charm and wide-eyed longing: he dreams of becoming a second Paganini and escaping the shackles of the Shtetl. Ambalu is also a wonderful violinist and it was a pleasure to hear the sometimes joyous, sometimes mournful playing.
Set against a striking Chagal background, the play centres on the family of Rochel, a young wife married to a schlemiel (Yiddish for a hopeless drip) who studies the Torah far more than the needs of his wife. There is the fierce mother in law and a slew of lazy men waited hand on foot by their subservient though gutsy womenfolk. Chief drip is her hubby Moyshe, nicely played by Elon Julius.
Coco Lefkow was outstanding as the tragic Rochel – caught like a kosher rat in a trap by her husband and the desires of Stempenyu to take her away. Unlike the Tevye story, there are no redeeming Jewish characters in this tale, no warmth, no understanding of Rochel’s pain. It is a much harsher world certainly than that of the Topol film.
The storyline is actually quite simple which is no bad thing as the music and dancing regularly interrupt the narrative flow. There is a genuinely spooky moment as a ghostly figure in white haunts the waking dreams of Rochel. Her inner dilemmas were powerfully portrayed and were genuinely moving.
The excellent band was also given a lot of lines to say, they being witnesses to the scandal of Rochel’s seduction by the fiddler. This was a less successful part as the musicians couldn’t easily be seen or heard (quite an important feature in any stage play).
Despite its weaknesses in clear storytelling (a Yiddish dictionary would come in handy) the show was a festival of colour, music and dance. You certainly don’t have to be Jewish to enjoy this lively, often electric production (yarmulkas off to co-directors Anna Sanderson and Lia Joffe) – it will have you dancing out of the theatre. But as you leave watch out for stray fiddlers perched on the roof.
