The first time Steven Skybell played Tevye, the father character in the musical “Fiddler on the Roof,” he was in high school.
“I was 17, and I was in Interlochen, Michigan at a summer arts camp that I went to for five summers,” Skybell said. “I played him in the musical there, and I’m happy to say I won Best Actor that summer.”
Skybell grew up in Lubbock and found his love for the theater during his childhood.
“I was a little Jewish actor boy growing up in Lubbock, Texas. There were 100 Jewish families there,” he said. “There was a children’s theater in Lubbock, Texas, and my brother was part of it, and I said to my mother, ‘I wanna do that.’ … I started doing plays when I was ten, and I have really never looked back.”
Throughout his career, Skybell has returned to the role of Tevye — including a stint at the Austin Opera for a production of “Fiddler on the Roof” running in early February.
“I played him when I was 21 at undergrad, Yale University. Then I had a big hiatus, I was looking for Tevye to play him and I never played him,” Skybell said. “Then finally I got the opportunity to play Tevye as an age-appropriate adult in the Yiddish version of ‘Fiddler on the Roof’ that the National Yiddish Theater did in New York City.”
Skybell said he loves “Fiddler on the Roof” because it has universal appeal.
“It’s essentially about a family, a husband and a wife, and their five daughters. And the three elder daughters are all of marriageable age,” he said. “And there’s complications and confusion about how to get these daughters married. It’s about a father who is a struggling dairyman, an impoverished dairyman. So I think a lot of people just can relate to the idea of a family.”
“Fiddler on the Roof” first opened on Broadway in 1964, and Skybell said much of the play’s political message is just as relevant today as it was back then.
“The lens opens up to show this village, this village of Jewish people that are ultimately, spoiler alert, forced out of their town. And so it’s a musical about family, it’s a musical about community, and it’s a musical about love and faith and about the intolerance that sometimes can happen in the world,” he said. “And so it’s certainly, sadly, a story relevant for our times about immigrants and intolerance, and all that can ensue from that.”
The first time Skybell played Tevye, he was concerned with looking the part of the elder patriarch with a false beard and makeup to make wrinkles on his face. Now that he’s grown into the role, he said he’s learned a lot from coming back to the character over and over.
“I’ve learned about Tevye as I’ve grown older, that he actually is quite optimistic and hopeful in a world that around him is less than that,” Skybell said. “(This play) is ultimately a message about peace and tolerance in a time that was less than that. And I hope that it’ll just get people’s hearts feeling hopeful for mending fences between people.”
