Hasidim watch ‘Fiddler on the Roof’ for first time

Even as the cinematic version of “Fiddler on the Roof” celebrates its 45th anniversary this year, there are still people out there who have not yet seen it. Among them are many Hasidim whose sheltered lifestyle doesn’t involve watching movies — not even blockbusters featuring characters dressed like, well, Hasidim.

In an attempt to rectify this, the Jew in the City website decided to show the film to some young American Hasidic men who had never before in their lives had the pleasure of singing along as Tevye the dairyman (played by Topol) belts out “If I Were a Rich Man,” or getting misty-eyed at the sound of “Sunrise, Sunset.”

According to Jew in the City creator Allison Josephs, finding four real-life Hasidic guys to star in the “Hasidic Jews Watch ‘Fiddler on the Roof’ for the First Time” video wasn’t so easy.

“Two of our actors (the ones without the peyos) are Chabad Lubavitch Hasidim, which means that in general, they are part of a more liberal sector of the Hasidic world and tend to interact more with the larger world. Because of this, it was hard to find guys who had never seen ‘Fiddler on the Roof’ before,” she wrote.

‘The papa has the last word in the house? No way!’

“Our other two actors are part of Hasidic groups which are generally more conservative and less involved with the larger world. However even that group is divided into more ‘modern Hasidic’ and more ‘ultra Hasidic’ elements. So to find people who were willing to watch and be in the video but had not seen in before, too, was a challenge,” she added.

Too confusing? Just know that the guys without accents are the Lubavitchers, and the guys wearing yarmulkes and speaking in Yiddish-inflected English are from another, more right-wing, Hasidic sect.

The Hasidim like some of the film’s scenes better than others, but overall they appear to enjoy the flick. Still, they had some questions about what they were seeing.

“They seem like the work too hard. I wouldn’t want to be there,” says one guy.

We’re with him on that. The Pale of Settlement wasn’t a fun place to live.

“The papa has the last word in the house? No way!” exclaims another of the men.

‘How come all these Jews have long hair?’

Again, we can’t disagree. A guy doesn’t need to have grown up watching Hollywood movies to be familiar with Jewish mothers.

“How come all these Jews have long hair?” one Hasid asks his friend.

“I guess they just didn’t have any barber shops,” the friend answers.

Or maybe it’s because the film was made in groovy 1971, when no one got their hair cut.

Commenters on the video launched into a debate on Facebook as to whether Sholom Aleichem, the great Jewish author upon whose stories “Fiddler on the Roof” is based, loved or hated Hasidim.

The Hasidic guys on camera didn’t bother with that conversation. It only took them a few glances at some scenes to know that “Fiddler on the Roof” is a Hollywood fantasy that does not hew closely to either Sholom Aleichem’s writing or to actual Jewish history.

“I think it’s a nice movie, but if you really want to know what Hasidim are about, you’re not going to get the real picture from this,” one said.

“The movie’s not even about Hasidim at all,” said another.

That didn’t stop them from singing and dancing along, though.