Fiddler on the Roof Previews- Page 9

[Mike Costa]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 12:02pm

"Also, as far as I understand, a click track is literally a track of clicks used to keep musicians in perfect sync like a metronome often used when the music needs to be in precise sync with an action on stage. It's not a pre-recorded orchestral track like many seem to believe. When a show uses click tracks, and the term is being properly applied, that's all it is. It's a digital metronome."

 

As a NYC Broadway musician I will tell you that the above statement is not true.  Broadway pit musicians are completely capable of playing in tempo without the use of a digital metronome.  A click track is used in the theater to add in anything that is not live and most shows on Broadway have used them for years from the vocal harmonies and percussion in Hamilton back to some of Christine's solo lines in Phantom and all of the vocals for One in A Chorus Line. 

 

The term "click track" refers to the clicks the conductor and drummer will hear in their headset a few bars before the pre-record is heard in the House so that they are in the same tempo and on the same beat as the pre-recorded music.

 

Updated On: 11/22/15 at 12:02 PM

[Musical Master]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 12:03pm

It is so wonderful that we're getting not only Whizzer's review but PalJoey's as well. Two very smart and insightful people reviewing Bartlett Sher's revival of Fiddler on the Roof how can this not be perfect?

[Musical Master]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 12:10pm

Jeffrey Karasarides said: "I messaged Whizzer to see if he was at the first preview, and he responded saying that he couldn't make it because of a conflict but he will be there tomorrow night."

 

A conflict? I hope Whizzer is doing okay.

[JM226]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 2:34pm

A conflict? I hope Whizzer is doing okay.

 

Right??? I can't believe the nerve! To have a life outside of this online message board... how crazy!

[Musical Master]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 2:45pm

JM226 said: "A conflict? I hope Whizzer is doing okay.

 

 

 

Right??? I can't believe the nerve! To have a life outside of this online message board... how crazy!"

 

Look I know that, everyone has a life outside of here. I just hope Whizzer is doing alright if this conflict is serious.

[Hamilton22]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 2:51pm

Dang people. Get a grip. 

[GreasedLightning]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 2:58pm

Everyone calm down. 

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 3:03pm

To literally everybody on this thread:

 

[Musical Master]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 3:14pm

Okay okay. Sorry about that. 

[Kad]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 3:17pm

Everyone is aware Whizzer has missed first previews before, yes? 

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 3:49pm

For real.  People, calm the hell down. We have a couple reviews posted already; is that not good enough? 

[bwayphreak234]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 3:55pm

Kad said: "Everyone is aware Whizzer has missed first previews before, yes?"

 

I was just thinking the same thing ha.

 

[Phantom4ever]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 3:57pm

Well it's intermission and wow this production is powerful.  This is my first time seeing a professional production of Fiddler.  The box office moved me from rear orchestra to 5th row center without saying anything about it.  Cool.  

The audience loves Burstein and Jessica Hecht seems born to play Golde.  Seems like Burstein wasn't ready for a lot of the laughs though because he would start his next line and then stop and wait so often.

The stagehands walking around pushing pieces into place got distracting. The one who "hid" under fruma Sarah was worst of all because he wore huge headphones and was totally visible but acted as if he was hidden by the costume. He moved around and flailed so much and was clearly arguing with someone over the headset.  

 

At at the end of act one the curtain closed over some of the scenery and it had to be pulled back up.

i wasn't a fan of suspending the house flats ten feet off the deck. At first it looked like a mistake but then they kept doing it. 

All in all a very powerful piece of theater and I am so glad I finally get to see a professional production of it

p.s.  Are some of the bottles supposed to fall off the dancers heads or..........? ??

 

[ljay889]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 4:04pm

The pushing of set pieces sounds like Sher's direction of Bridges. Is it similar? 

[Hamilton22]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 4:05pm

"p.s. Are some of the bottles supposed to fall off the dancers heads or..........? ??"

 

lmao

Updated On: 11/22/15 at 04:05 PM

[Musical Master]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 4:05pm

The bottles during The Wedding scene are supposed to stay on the dancers heads when they dance together. Yep this definitely sounds like preview hiccups alright.

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 4:30pm

Aren't the bottles supposed to be attached with velcro or magnets so they don't fall off? I've always assumed there was a trick to it.

[A Director]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 4:56pm

About the Bottle Dance in the original production: " He [Robbins] permitted no tricks -- no holes cut into the crowns, no Vlecro. He wanted the audience to feel the tension -- for the sheer theatrical thrill as well as for the emotional echo of the precarious eponymous fiddler trying to scratch out a tune without breaking his neck."  from "Wonders of Wonders A Cultural History of Fiddler on the Roof" by Alisa Solomon

[FunnyGirl5]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 5:00pm

Lets all shoot ourselves and star world war iii this is the worst disaster ever (sarcasm)

 

sinister teashop said: "This disaster of a thread is what happens when we don't get a Whizzer first preview post. Please come back, Whizzer.

 

 

 

Agreed, which is why critics used to get paid by newspapers who understood their value.

 

"

 

[theatreguy12]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 5:16pm

I saw a national tour of FOTR with Topol, and one of the dancers lost the bottle at the very end.  He almost had it nailed, but alas, no.  The audience gave him applause, to which he responded in a congenial way.

[Phantom4ever]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 6:00pm

Well those bottles are made of plastic because they bounced all over the stage once they fell and at some points they were at gravity-defying angles to the hats.   That said, the sliding element in the bottle dance was very effective.   The audience around me couldn't decide if the bottles falling were intentional or not which added to the thrill of it in a weird way.

 

Act 2 featured the worst rendition of "now I have everything" I have ever heard.  

[CurtainPullDowner]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 6:26pm

I learned this the hard way, but the Bottles are not supposed to be attached and way to the hats and (as in the real folk dance) if you drop a bottle you are suppose to drop out of the dance. Did this happen?

And I am surprised to hear the bottles looked like plastic, the best bottles for the dance are heavy glass with very heavy bottoms, like champagne bottles, they are the easiest to balance.  And when done correctly the Knee Slides are always very gasp inducing.

[SNAFU]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 6:30pm

Do they allow real glass on a Broadway Stage? Drop a bottle, it lands just right and you have shattered ghlass everywhere.

[Musical Master]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 6:50pm

This is a Fiddler on the Roof story I need to know: Back in 1964, is it true that Jerome Robbins and Zero Mostel bickered a lot because of Robbins naming names during the McCarthy witch hunt in the 1950's and that Robbins drove everyone crazy during rehearsals?

[Kad]

Posted: 11/22/15 at 7:01pm

There's nothing in the Production rulebook that specifically prohibits glass on Broadway, but there are provisions for safety, which having glass objects involved in choreography would most likely violate.

Updated On: 11/22/15 at 07:01 PM