Under the Sign of Tevye-Tevel

Every play eventually becomes dated and is eventually removed from the repertoire. Not so Serhiy Danchenko’s production of Tevye-Tevel, based on Sholom Aleichem’s Tevye der Milkhiker [Tevye the Milkman]. The play has some sort of secret. Years may pass, but the play remains a hit. Bohdan Stupka has appeared on stage as Tevye three hundred times and each time people leave the theater deeply moved.

In this play stage director Serhiy Danchenko and production designer Danylo Lider have succeeded in combining human macro- and microworlds. Thousands of reviews and monographs have been written about the Milky Way and the jug of milk that is used in the setting, and about Stupka’s brilliant acting. The Ivan Franko Theater Company’s production is even mentioned in textbooks as the best production of contemporary Ukrainian theater. In 1993 Tevye-Tevel won Lider, Stupka, and the actress Natalia Lototska the Shevchenko Prize.

Bohdan Stupka admits that he has had three very special performances in his career: Stolen Happiness, Uncle Vanya, and Tevye-Tevel, and all three are associated with Serhiy Danchenko.

“Finding the right kind of stage director is the greatest happiness for an actor,” says Bohdan Stupka, “I might add, though, that Serhiy Danchenko discovered me when lots of critics believed I had no potential and even said I was a ‘negatively charming actor.’ Our creative collaboration has lasted for over thirty years. We’ve done twenty plays together. For me, Serhiy Danchenko has been not only a stage director but also a friend and teacher. After his death I felt like an orphan.

“We’re staging Tevye-Tevel on Thursday and dedicating it to Serhiy Danchenko. All the actors who have been in the cast in different years will appear on stage in the finale. Even now the cast includes several generations of actors. Natalia Lototska is my regular partner as Tevye’s wife Golde. We had an excellent cast for the premiere in 1989, with Viktor Tsymbalist (Lazar Wolf), Mykola Zadniprovsky (Nachum), Yelizaveta Slutska (Tzeitel), Liudmyla Smorodina (Hodl), Iryna Doroshenko (Chava), Yuri Tsarychev (Stepan), and Arsen Tymoshenko (Perchik). Tickets for the second performance were bought by the Jewish community of Kyiv, so I decided to say a couple of lines in Yiddish in the tavern scene. I had rehearsed them with an expert but forgot some of them on my way onstage. Raising a glass of vodka, I was supposed to say ameh haje, but instead said akhe maje. No response from the audience. I though they hadn’t heard it, so I raised another glass and repeated the words louder. Silence. So I downed a third glass and yelled at the top of my voice akhe maje!!! And then I saw that they were all doubled over laughing their heads off. Well, I found out about my mistake during the intermission. By the way, I eventually learned a couple of more Yiddish phrases and now use them on stage, and many people think that I speak fluent Yiddish.

I was happy when Sholom Aleichem’s granddaughter Bel Kaufman said she had watched many productions of Tevye the Milkman, but that the Franko company’s rendition was the best. We have performed it at many festivals and toured with it in Russia, Germany, the U.S., and Belarus. Next year we’re bringing it to Poland. Tevye-Tevel is one of the Franko Theater Company’s calling cards.”