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"FIDDLER ON THE ROOF"
S.A.T. EXAM
Marjorie Gottlieb Wolfe
Syosset, New York
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Imagine if the officials at ETS and the College Board offered a S.A.T. exam on the show/movie, "Fiddler on the Roof." Grab a #2 "blayer" (pencil) and let's see how well you do. A "perfekt" score is 2400...but let's not be concerned with the grade. Good luck!
1. Anatevka : fictional town in the Pale of Settlement of the Russian Empire :
A) Chelm : mythical town in Poland
B) Lake Wobegon : fictional town in Minn.
C) Schnippishok : mythical city used in jokes and proverbs
D) Brigadoon : mythical Scottish town
E) "Our Town" : Grover's Corner, NH
F) All of the above
2. What, according to Tevye, kept the balance in Anatevka?
A) "religye"
B) "traditsye"
C) (the) "shadchen"/"shadchan"
3. How many years did it take Tevye to ask Golde, "Do you love me?"
A) five
B) thirteen
C) twenty-five
4. Lazar Wolf : der katsev : :
A) Molly Picon : Yente, the "shadkhen"
B) Motel : der shnayder
C) Perchik : der larer
D) All of the above
5. In Act I of "Fiddler," Tevye talks directly to God. He says that he wishes he was
A) "frum" (pious)
B) "ongeshtopt" (very wealthy)
C) "raykh" (wealthy)
D) "nit khasene gehat" (unmarried)
6. Beatrice Arthur once played what role in "Fiddler"?
A) Yente
B) Chava
C) Grandma Tzeitel
7. When Molly Picon played Yente, she was called the "Yiddish Helen Hayes."
A) True
B) False
8. Reb Nachem is
A) a "betler"
B) a "shnorer"
C) a "hoizer"
D) All of the above
9. Who tells God, "I know. I know. We are the chosen people. But once in a while can't you choose someone else?"
A) Perchik
B) Motel
C) Tevye
10. "Chavaleh" means
A) friend
B) little bird
C) shawl
11. In "Fiddler," the rabbi is asked if there is a proper blessing for the Tsar. The rabbi replies:
A) Of course! May God bless and keep the Tsar...far away from us.
B) No! "Nain."
C) "Tokhes oyfn tish!" (Get serious! Buttocks on the table!)
12. William Paley once backed out of an opportunity to finance "Fiddler on the Roof" because he found it to be "too Jewish."
A) True
B) False
C) "Ver vaist!" (Who knows!)
13. Yente said,
A) If God lived on earth, people would break his windows.
B) God gives us the ingredients for our daily bread, but He expects us to do the baking.
C) God is more interested in inner space than in outer space.
14. The villagers come to Tevye's "heym" holding a newspaper. It states that
A)_ the shtetl is having its first "B-A-R-K Mitzvah"; one of the dogs is turning 13. Muzzle Tov!
B) the Jews were all evicted from a nearby village.
C) someone from Anatevka found alternative uses for Matzoh: roof shingles, military body armor, kitchen floor tiles, and coasters
15. During Blacklist fever, some folksingers succumbed to the pressure and cooperated with the inquisiton. Those whose names had been mentioned by actors or directors coooperating with the witch-hunt felt mortally offended, and in turn ostracized the namers of names. Who almost refused to do "Fiddler on the Roof" because Jerome Robbins, the play's director, had caved in to HUAC?
A) Zero Mostel
B) Theodore Bikel
C) Herschel Bernardi
16. The word "shtetl" literally means
A) a ramschakle collection of wooden houses, shops and communal buildings connected by icy, dusty, or muddy streets
B) little town
C) a wig
17. Who said, "You do not have to be Jewish to play in Fiddler on the Roof, you
only have to be a good actor. Intelligence
and well-rounded knowledge also help...
From time to time one gets a little startled
to see entire Jewish families on stage or
screen portrayed by Gentiles. But it is
annoying only when it is badly done"?
A) Theodore Biiel ("The Autobiography of
Theodore Bikel")
B) Harvey Pekar & Paul Bunle ("Yiddishkeit - Jewish Vernacular & The New Land")
C) "Michael Wex ("How to Be a Mentsh & Not a Shmuck")
18. Who wrote, "When Tevye leaves his shtetl, audiences throughout the world break down in tears. Even if they have never heard of Hebrew or Yiddish, even if they know nothing about the Millennia of exile, they feel some loss of that nourishing home"?
A) Miriam Weinstein, ("A Nation of Words")
B) Leo Rosten, ("Hooray for Yiddish!")
C) Howard Greenfeld, ("After the Holocaust")
19. At one performance of "Fiddler," when Zero Mostel played Tevye, der milikher (the dairyman), he was singing the duet "Do You Love Me?" with Golde. Tevye pats Golde's hand. Then Zero ran up the aisle in the dark and shouted from the back of the "zal" (auditorium), "And that night Tevye had Golde!"
A) True
B) False. A "bubba meisses"/"bubba meisseh"
20. In 1967, "Fiddler"appeared for a full six-month run in Sin City (Las Vegas). Who starred as Tevye?
A) Leonard Nimoy
B) Harvey Fierstein
C) Theodore Bikel
21 Who said,"Yente, to me, was a kind of Baba Yachna, a richer, funnier character much like the ones I played in the Yiddish theater. Vincent Canby, the major film critic of The New York Times, called my portrayal the only authentic Yente he had seen"?
A) Sophie Tucker
B) Kate Smith
C) Molly Picon
22. Who wanted Molly Picon to record an album of "Fiddler on the Roof" in London?
A) Robert Merrill
B) Mitch Miller
C) Roberta Peters
D) Elmer Bernstein
23. Bette Midler played the part of one of Tevya's daughters on Broadway.
A) True
B) False
24. In "Fiddler" you may recall a line of black-suited men, arms linked, knees jackknifed in deep plie, brows furrowed in concentration, slowly deliberately thrusting their legs out and propelling themselves forward. What dance were they performing?
A) Mezhinka/Mezinke
B) Hora
C) Bottle Dance
D) Gladdening of the Bride
25. Fyedka [introducing himself to Chava], said that he's
A) a pleasant fellow ("khevre-man")
B) charming
C) honest ("ortlekh")
D) ambitious ("ambitsyez")
E) quite bright ("inteligents")
F) very modest
G) All of the above
26. According to Bryan Fogel and Sam Wolfson ("Jewtopia"), You should fly El Al because the in-flight movie is always
A) Yentl
B) Fiddler on the Roof
C) The Chosen
D) Blazing Saddles
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ANSWERS:
1. A, B, C and E (Brigadoon, D, appears for
one day every hundred years.)
2. B (tradition)
3. C
4. D Lazer Wolf is a butcher; Motel is a
tailor; and Perchik is a teacher. Re: the
role of the professional matchmaker:
Rabbi Benjamin Blech says, "Not to
worry; the matchmaker won't make a
mistake in judgment. Jewish tradition
has it that the ultimate matchmaker is
none other than God, who decrees 40
days before the birth of every child
whom that person will marry! ("The
Complete Idiot's Guide to Learning
Yiddish")
5. C
6. A
7. A
8. D (They all mean "beggars.")
9. C
10. B
11. A
12. A
13. A
14. B ("C" was suggested by Bryan Fogel
and Sam Wolfson in "Jewtopia.")
15. A
16. B
17. B
18. A
19. A
20. C
21. C
22. A
23. T
24. C The dancers had wine bottles perched precariously on their hats. According to Wallace Munro, "Periodically,
one of the dancers [in "Fiddler on the Roof") had to drop his bottle. Jerome
Robbins wanted it to be understood that
those bottles weren't glued on--they were
really balanced.
25. F
26. A, B, and C
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MARJORIE WOLFE shares this quote by
Arnold Fine ("The Jewish Press," Oct. 26,
2001):
"When 'Fiddler on the Roof' opened on Broadway in 1960 starring Zero Mostel, theatrical people could not believe that anyone in their right mind would bring a Yiddish show to Broadway. In fact, before the show opened, newspaper columnists laughed, "...a Jewish show on Broadway-- are they crazy? Impossible! For goodness sake, Jewish shows couldn't even make it on 2nd Avenue in New York City, with its dwindling Yiddish speaking population. How in the world will a Jewish show make it on Broadway? Do you think Gentiles will come to see a Jewish show just because it's on Broadway?"
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