September 22, 1964: "Fiddler On the Roof" Premieres

September 22, 1964: Fiddler On the Roof premieres at the Imperial Theatre in New York. It becomes the longest-running musical in Broadway history, a record long since broken.

Jerry Bock wrote the music, and Sheldon Harnick wrote the lyrics. They had previously collaborated on the 1959 musical Fiorello! about former New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia. Joseph Stein wrote the "book," based on Tevye and His Daughters, a 1905 collection of short stories by Ukrainian-born Jewish writer Solomon Naumovich Rabinovich, who wrote under the pen name Sholem Aleichem.

The story takes place in Anatevka, a shtetl (a Yiddish word for a small town made up mostly of Jews) in the Russian Empire in 1905, a year of a failed revolution. The narrator is Tevye, a middle-aged milkman with a wife and 5 daughters, but no sons. This is key, because, traditionally -- and not just in Judaism -- it is the father of the bride who pays for a wedding. And, as Tevye says, "I realize, of course, that it's no shame to be poor. But it's no great honor, either."

(In Rabinovich's original story, the character's full name is Tevye ben Shneur Zalman. "Tevye" is a Yiddish form of "Tuyva," meaning "God is good." In Greek, "Tuvya" becames "Tobias"; in the English-speaking world, it is often shortened to "Toby." Neither Rabinovich nor Alex Haley -- who allegedly had an ancestor named Kunta Kinte, forced to accept the slave name Toby Waller, or Toby Reynolds in the TV version of Roots -- ever commented publicly on that.)

He begins the play with talk of tradition, and a song titled "Tradition," and says that, for the people there, in their poverty, where they have little freedom due to the impressive regime of Czar Nicholas II, their lives are as precarious as the perch of a fiddler on a roof. Someone asks the local rabbi if there is a blessing for the Czar. He says, "May the Lord bless and keep the Czar... far away from us!"

Like everyone else in Anatevka, Teyve is poor. How poor is he? He has to deliver milk himself, since he can't afford to replace his lame horse. He begins the song "If I Were a Rich Man" in a good mood, imagining what it would be like, but ends it in sadness, asking God if it would "spoil some vast eternal plan." (The song was based on Rabinovich's monologue in his book, "If I Were a Rothschild," with the Rothschilds, a banking family, being a byword for rich Jews to this day.)

One of his daughters is supposed to marry the richest man in town ("rich" being relative there), a butcher who is even older than Tevye. But she loves a tailor instead, and the tailor talks Tevye into allowing their marriage. But another daughter loves a Christian boy who had protected her from an attack by his people, and Tevye refuses to cross the line of allowing his daughter an interfaith marriage, so they run off and elope. Tevye laments the passage of time, singing of his children, "I don't recall growing older. When did they?"

Finally, a constable arrives, and tells the town that it must be abandoned in 3 days, so that native Russians can take it over. Tevye decides to take his wife and remaining daughters to America, while the married ones and their husbands go to Poland, then also still under Russian (and, partly, German) control. The fiddler plays one last song, and then leaves the stage as well.

In the original production, Tevye was played by Brooklyn-born Jewish comedian Samuel Joel "Zero" Mostel, a triumph for him after having been blacklisted during the Red Scare of the 1950s. Calling his former film studio "18th Century Fox," he said, "What did they think I was going to do, sell acting secrets to the Russians?" Maria Karnilova played Tevye's wife Goldie. Beatrice Arthur and future game show host Bert Convy were also in the original cast.

Mostel also played Tevye in a 1976 Broadway revival. In 1969, folksinger Theodore Bikel, founder of the Newport Folk Festival, succeeded Mostel in the role. He had previously starred in a nonmusical version, Tevye the Milkman, and ended up playing the part more nights than any other actor, even Mostel.

When the musical first played in the West End, London's version of Broadway, in 1967, Tevye was played by Israel-born actor Chaim Topol. He would also star in the 1971 film version, revivals in the West End in 1983 and 1994, and a Broadway revival in 1990. Herschel Bernardi starred in a 1981 Broadway revival. The most recent Broadway revival, in 2015, starred Danny Burstein.

Norman Jewison, the perhaps aptly-named director of the 1971 film, chose Topol because he though Mostel's version relied too heavily on comedy, and he wanted to lean on the serious side of the story. He had previously told the story of a black hero in a white racist place in directing In the Heat of the Night, and later directed Moonstruck, about Italian-Americans.

In 2004, Gwen Stefani adapted a 1993 rewrite of "If I Were a Rich Man," "Rich Girl," and hit Number 1 with it. That same year, a Broadway revival starred Alfred Molina, who would play Tevye by night, and, by day, still in New York, would film scenes as the villainous Dr. Otto Octavius, a.k.a. Doctor Octopus, a.k.a. Doc Ock, for the film Spider-Man 2. He even filmed a scene of himself in costume as Doc Ock, singing "If I Were a Rich Man," resulting in the character's mechanical arms dancing along with him.

Molina was succeeded the following year by Harvey Fierstein, better known as a playwright. He told an interviewer that someone asked him how, as one of America's most prominent openly gay men, he could play the role of a husband and father. His response was that, when he was cast as Edna Turnblad in the musical version of Hairspray, he had never been, or played, a woman before. In contrast, Tevye was a Jewish man, and he had been a Jewish man his whole life. Of course, his famously gravelly voice wasn't made for singing on Broadway. But it worked just fine for the scatting in "If I Were a Rich Man."

Mostel died in 1977, Bernardi in 1986, Karnilova in 2001, Bock and Stein in 2010. As of September 22, 2022, Harnick, Topol, Jewison, Molina, Feirstein and Burstein are still alive. (UPDATE: Topol died on March 8, 2023. Harnick died on June 23, 2023, 10 months short of what would have been his 100th birthday. Jewison died on January 20, 2024.)

The Imperial Theatre is still in operation, at 249 West 45th Street, between 8th Avenue and Broadway. Among the other shows that have premiered there are Babes in Toyland in 1930, On Your Toes in 1936, Annie Get Your Gun in 1946, Call Me Madam in 1950, The Most Happy Fella in 1956, Oliver! in 1963, Pippin in 1972, They're Playing Our Song in 1979, and Dreamgirls in 1981.

One day, when I was about 12 or so, the film version of Fiddler On the Roof was on TV, and my parents told me, "This is your heritage." I had grown up with the idea that my father's ancestors were Polish and from a city like Warsaw, while my mother's ancestors were Jewish and from a little shtetl in the Russian Empire, like Anatevka.

It was many years before I found out that the truth was the other way around: My mother's ancestors came from a good-sized city, Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania (although also controlled by Russia at the time), while my father's ancestors came from Borki Wielkie, in a part of northeastern Poland that was then part of East Prussia in the German Empire, and barely more than a village.

Oh well. As Tevye might have said, It's no shame to be wrong, but it's no great honor, either.

*

September 22, 1964 was a Tuesday. The TV show The Man from U.N.C.L.E. premiered on this day. I have a separate entry for this event.

These baseball games were played that day:

* The New York Yankees swept a doubleheader from the Cleveland Indians, 5-3 and 8-1 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Mel Stottlemyre won the opener, Whitey Ford the nightcap. Home runs were hit by Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris, Joe Pepitone and Phil Linz.

* The New York Mets lost to the St. Louis Cardinals, 2-1 at Shea Stadium. Curt Simmons outpitched Tracey Stallard.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 9-2 at Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia. This was the 2nd game of the 10-game "Phillie Phlop" that cost Philadelphia the National League Pennant. Frank Robinson went 2-for-4 with a home run, a walk, and 2 RBIs. Pete Rose also went 2-for-4 with a walk.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Washington Senators, 3-0 at District of Columbia Stadium in Washington. (It was renamed Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium in 1969.) Bill Monboquette pitched a 5-hit shutout, and Carl Yastrzemski went 1-for-3 with a walk.

* The Milwaukee Braves beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 2-0 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Bob Veale pitched a 7-hit shutout. Roberto Clemente went 3-for-4. Hank Aaron went 1-for-4.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Baltimore Orioles, 2-1 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit. Al Kaline went 2-for-4 with a home run and 2 RBIs. Brooks Robinson went 0-for-4 with a walk.

* The Chicago Cubs beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 1-0 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Lew Burdette pitched a perfect 1st inning for the Cubs, then had to leave the game due to an injury. Cal Koonce pitched a 7-hit shutout the rest of the way, outpitching Don Drysdale. Ernie Banks went 0-for-3.

* The Kansas City Athletics beat the Minnesota Twins, 10-9 at Kansas City Municipal Stadium. Harmon Killebrew went 1-for-4 with a walk.

* The San Francisco Giants beat the Houston Colt .45s, 7-1 at Colt Stadium in Houston. Willie Mays went 1-for-4 with a walk and an RBI. The Colts became the Houston Astros the next season.

* And The Los Angeles Angels beat the Chicago White Sox, 1-0 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, where the Angels were groundsharing while waiting for their stadium in suburban Anaheim to be ready. Fred Newman pitched a 5-hit shutout.

August 2, 1967: "In the Heat of the Night" Premieres

Sidney Poitier (left) and Rod Steiger

August 2, 1967: The film In the Heat of the Night premieres, directed by Norman Jewison, and based on a 1965 novel by John Ball. Quincy Jones wrote the score and the theme song, which was sung by Ray Charles.

Three years earlier, Sidney Poitier had become the 1st black man to receive the Academy Award for Best Actor. Still, born in Miami and raised in The Bahamas -- and thus having both American and British citizenship -- he knew what racism existed in the American South, and did not want to film any of his scenes in the American South. Not wanting to lose him, Jewison shot all of Poitier's scenes in Sparta, Illinois -- in southern Illinois, not exactly a place that welcomed civil rights activists -- while filming scenes without him in Dyersburg and Union City, Tennessee.

Poitier played Virgil Tibbs, who is arrested by Officer Sam Wood (played by Warren Oates) at the train station in Sparta, Mississippi, for the murder of wealthy industrialist Phillip Colbert (an uncredited Jack Teter). The police chief, Bill Gillespie (Rod Steiger), looks through his wallet, and discovers a badge: Tibbs is a homicide detective with the Philadelphia police, and was visiting his mother in Sparta.

A calendar in Gillespie's office reveals the date as September 12, 1966, which suggests the date of filming. There actually is an unincorporated community in northeastern Mississippi named Sparta. The choice of Philly as Tibbs' adopted hometown cannot be a coincidence: In 1964, 3 civil rights workers had been murdered by the Ku Klux Klan in the town of Philadelphia, Mississippi. Gillespie hears the name "Virgil," and says to Tibbs: "That's a funny name for a (N-word) boy that comes from Philadelphia! What do they call you up there?" Tibbs angrily tells him. "They call me Mister Tibbs!"

Tibbs wants to leave town on the next train, but his Chief in Philadelphia suggests he stay in Sparta to help Gillespie with the murder investigation. Though Gillespie, like many of Sparta's white residents, is racist, he and Tibbs reluctantly agree to work together. This leads to Tibbs' detective skills overruling the town doctor as to when and where the murder occurred, and the Sparta police for overlooking the alibi of a suspect, Harvey Oberst (Scott Wilson).

Tibbs initially suspects the murderer is wealthy plantation owner Eric Endicott (Larry Gates), a genteel racist and Sparta's most powerful citizen, who publicly opposed Colbert's new factory. When Tibbs begins interrogating him, Endicott slaps him, to which Tibbs responds by slapping him back. Afterwards, Endicott sends a gang of local thugs after him. Gillespie rescues Tibbs and tells him to leave town to save himself, but Tibbs is determined to stay and solve the case.

The scene of Tibbs slapping Endicott is not present in the novel. According to Poitier, the scene was almost not in the movie, and it was he who had proposed the idea of Tibbs slapping Endicott back. In the textbook Civil Rights and Race Relations in the USA, Poitier stated: "I said, 'I'll tell you what, I'll make this movie for you if you give me your absolute guarantee when he slaps me I slap him right back, and you guarantee that it will play in every version of this movie.' I try not to do things that are against nature."

It turns out that Officer Wood has a 16-year-old girlfriend, Delores Purdy (Quentin Dean). Her brother Lloyd (James Patterson -- not the mystery novelist) wants to press statutory rape charges against Wood for getting her pregnant. Tibbs wants to be present for Delores' questioning. Lloyd is offended, and gathers a lynch mob to go after Tibbs.

Tibbs pressures illegal abortionist Mama Caleba (Beah Richards), who is black, to reveal that she is about to provide an abortion for Delores. (Roe v. Wade was still over 5 years away.) When Delores arrives and sees Tibbs, she runs away. Tibbs follows Delores and confronts her armed boyfriend, Ralph (Anthony James), a cook at a local roadside diner.

Lloyd's mob arrives and holds Tibbs at gunpoint. Tibbs tells Lloyd to check Delores' purse for the $100 that Ralph gave her for an abortion, which he got from killing and robbing Colbert. Lloyd realizes Tibbs is right when he opens the purse and finds the money. After Lloyd confronts Ralph for getting his sister pregnant, Ralph shoots Lloyd, killing him. Tibbs grabs Ralph's gun as Gillespie arrives on the scene.

Ralph is arrested, and confesses to the killing of Colbert. He explains that after hitchhking a ride with Colbert and asking him for a job, Ralph attacked him at the construction site of the new factory, intending only to knock Colbert unconscious and rob him, but accidentally killing him instead.

Tibbs arrives at the station to meet the next train that will return himto Philadelphia, as Gillespie, having carried his suitcase, shakes Tibbs' hand and bids him farewell. In the final interaction between Gillespie and Tibbs, as the detective ascends the stairs onto the train, for one last time Gillespie calls out to him and sincerely tells Tibbs: "You take care, you hear?" After a moment of hesitation, Tibbs turns around to face Gillespie and gives a warm smile in reply. Gillespie smiles back at Tibbs as he boards the train.

The time of this film's release may have been a "Summer of Love" in San Francisco, but, in so many other places, it was "The Long Hot Summer" and "The Year of Living Dangerously." And it was all because of the lingering effects of what America's white aristocracy had done to black people. And to poor white people, too: A few weeks later, the Number 1 song in America would be "Ode to Billie Joe" by Bobbie Gentry, set in rural Mississippi.

Still, the film aimed to both expose and heal. It certainly did the former, and maybe it helped to do the latter, too. After all, the symbolism is undeniable. When the film begins, it's the middle of the night, and everything is dark and foreboding, and nobody feels like smiling, even before they find out there's been a murder. When it ends, it's midday, and the film's formerly antagonistic protagonists, their mission accomplished, are smiling.

The film was nominated for 7 Academy Awards, winning Best Picture, and Best Actor for Steiger. Poitier made 2 sequels, with the character having moved to San Francisco and being married to a woman named Valerie, played by actress and jazz singer Barbara McNair: They Call Me MISTER Tibbs! in 1970 and The Organization in 1971. Both films did well at the box office, but not as well as the original.

Neither of these films was based on Ball's subsequent novels about Tibbs, all of which, like the original, set the action outside Los Angeles in Pasadena, California: The Cool Cottontail (1966), Johnny Get Your Gun (1969), Five Pieces of Jade (1972), The Eyes of Buddha (1976), Then Came Violence (1980) and Singapore (1986).

Jewison seemed to specialize in making films of Broadway plays, including the musical Fiddler on the Roof (1971), the musical Jesus Christ Superstar (1973), A Soldier's Story (1984) and Agnes of God (1985). He also directed The Cincinnati Kid (1965), The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming (1966), the original version of The Thomas Crown Affair (1968), the original version of Rollerball (1975), ...And Justice for All (1979) and The Hurricane (1999).

James Patterson died in 1972, Warren Oates in 1982, John Ball in 1988, Larry Gates in 1996, Beah Richards in 2000, Rod Steiger in 2002, Quentin Dean in 2003, Barbara McNair in 2007, Scott Wilson in 2018, Anthony James in 2020, and Sidney Poitier in 2022. As of August 2, 2022, Norman Jewison is still alive. So is Lee Grant, who played Mrs. Colbert, widow of the murder victim. (UPDATE: Jewison died in 2024.)

In 1988, NBC began a TV version of In the Heat of the Night, but played with the timeline: The show took place in the present day, but the events of the previous meeting between Tibbs and Gillespie are said to have taken place only "a few years ago." Tibbs returns to Sparta for his mother's funeral, and is persuaded by the Mayor to stay and integrate the town's all-white police force as Chief of Detectives.

Tibbs was played by Howard Rollins, and Gillespie by Carroll O'Connor, who had played Archie Bunker on All in the Family. Both Archie and Gillespie had to learn to suppress their bigotry, but, by the time the TV show began, Gillespie had proven better at it than Archie.

The show ran 4 years on NBC, then switched to CBS for 3 years, but Rollins' legal and health issues made it impossible to continue: He died in 1996, only a year and a half after the show aired its last episode. O'Connor's son, Hugh O'Connor, played Officer Lonnie Jamison. Like Rollins, Hugh had drug problems, causing him legal problems, and couldn't take it anymore, and killed himself in 1995, during the show's last days.

*

August 2, 1967 was a Wednesday. These baseball games were played that day:

* The New York Yankees lost to the California Angels, 5-4 at Yankee Stadium. Bill Monbouquette blew a 4-3 lead in the 9th inning. Mickey Mantle went 0-for-2 with 2 walks.

* The New York Mets lost to the Houston Astros, 5-2 at the Astrodome in Houston.

* The Kansas City Athletics beat the Boston Red Sox, 8-6 at Fenway Park in Boston. Carl Yastrzemski went 2-for-4.

* A doubleheader was split at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. The Detroit Tigers won the opener, 4-2. Al Kaline went 1-for-4 with a home run and 2 RBIs in the 1st game, then sat out the nightcap. The Baltimore Orioles won that, 2-1. Over the 2 games, Brooks Robinson went 4-for-8 with a home run and 2 RBIs, and Frank Robinson went 1-for-5 with 3 walks and an RBI on a bases-loaded walk.

* The Washington Senators beat the Minnesota Twins, 5-4 at District of Columbia Stadium in Washington. (It was renamed Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium in 1969.) Hank Allen singled Ed Stroud home with the winning run in the bottom of the 11th inning.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Chicago White Sox, 5-1 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Atlanta Braves, 7-3 at Crosley Field in Cincinnati. Pete Rose went 3-for-4 with 2 home runs, a walk and 2 RBIs. Hank Aaron went 4-for-5 with an RBI.

* The St. Louis Cardinals swept their arch-rivals, the Chicago Cubs, 4-2 and 7-1 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Over the 2 games, Lou Brock went 6-for-10 with a stolen base and 2 RBIs. Ernie Banks went 1-for-7 with a home run, a walk and an RBI. Steve Carlton won the 2nd game for the Cardinals, but Bob Gibson did not pitch in either game: This was during his time on the Disabled List with a broken leg.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 3-2 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. Dick Allen singled Billy Cowan home with the winning run in the top of the 10th inning.

* And the San Francisco Giants beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 7-2 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. Willie Mays and Roberto Clemente both hit home runs.