Rows of wooden dining chairs lined the small stage inside Capital Manor, loaned from various homes and apartments in the West Salem retirement community. Behind them, a hand-painted backdrop featured a village, a setting sun and the silhouette of a fiddler on the roof.

That’s who Carolyn Van Otten is playing in the community’s first-ever theater production. Her prop fiddle, broken and missing a few strings, came from a downtown Salem music store’s junk pile. Her costume, like others in the play, was tailored by residents and staff.

She opened “Fiddler on the Roof,” leading the cast of 36 in through the back doors to take their place on stage for the first song, “Tradition.”

“When I come in at the beginning, I’m dancing and I’m smiling and I’m nodding to people, and I’m pretending to play,” she said. “And that’s a pretty tall order for somebody who’s 82.”

The cast, all over age 70, has been in rehearsals for over two months to ready four performances over a two-week period in March. 

The 1964 musical takes place in the early 1900s in a Jewish community in Russia. The main character, Tevye, is a father of five daughters who want to marry for love amid a time of political persecution.

Capital Manor is performing a specially-made version of the play for seniors, which condenses the 2.5-hour runtime into an hour by shortening songs and cutting scenes. Actors can carry their scripts with them on stage.

“We can sing, we can remember lines and we can move around on the stage. But not all three together,” said Jane Murch-Billings, who plays Bielke, the youngest daughter.

The production has been dubbed “recreational theater” by Music Theatre International, the company that revised the scripts.

It’s a term that Dave Votaw, who plays the lead Tevye, appreciates. The performances aren’t open to the public, and the audience will be filled by residents and their families.

“It’s not about how wonderful we are, and there’s no egos involved. It’s just people having fun and doing their best to make fun for the audience. And we have the best audience in the world,” Votaw said.

Votaw, who directs the choir at Capital Manor, said it’s the largest project happening in the community. The 40-acre property is home to about 460 people who live in a mix of homes, apartments and assisted living. The community is also known for crafting wooden toys to donate to local Head Start programs.

Votaw said the musical endeavor began last year, when Robert Salberg, who directs Salem’s Children’s Educational Theatre, reached out with the news that there were productions of Broadway shows for seniors available.

Votaw was interested and knew others would be, too. He and several other residents had recently written and performed a radio play.

And Salberg knew the director for the job: Deborah Johansen, who has been a theater director for 45 years. She’s worked as a middle and high school drama teacher, at Salem’s Pentacle Theatre and at local churches.

“I’ve never worked with an entire cast of elderly people before,” Johansen said. “And it’s funny, because I’m 73, I’m not a spring chicken.”

She guessed that the average age of the cast is 80. That comes with unique challenges, she said, like difficulty remembering cues and a slower pace which makes the play typically stretch 15 minutes longer than planned.

Due to the community’s enthusiasm, the production added costumes, more choreography and more complexity to what began as a largely stationary script-reading, she said.

“This has challenged me more than anything I’ve ever done in 45 years,” Johansen said. “As it got more and more involved, I’m like, ‘Oh, what have I created?’”

But there’s been visible progress. Johansen said every performance has gotten better, and everyone has gotten more confident. 

“The biggest highlight is just how enthusiastic and excited this group is,” Johansen said. “They have been a delight to work with. Positive, so supportive of me, wanting to do their best, just really trying hard. And I think it shows.”

She’s been volunteering her time to get the play in shape, with weekly rehearsals starting in January and more frequent meetings in the month leading up to showtime. 

Many in the cast have no theater experience. Others haven’t performed since high school, or church plays decades prior.

“That’s probably been my favorite part, is getting to work with this group of people that are inexperienced, and took a risk and did something they’ve never done before,” Johansen said. “A couple of nights, I’ve gotten a lump in my throat. Just in the rehearsal, watching them, and realizing how hard they’re working and how badly they want to do well.”

Joanne Stern, a 16-year resident of the community, joined the play because she was a fan of its music. She plays a villager in the chorus and said that the close, repeated study of the script has made her realize the greater impact of the play’s political message. The play ends with the Jewish villagers being evicted.

”It’s easy to see this play as just being cute,” Stern said. “But the same things have happened in this country, and are still happening in this country.”

Jim Herzog, 86, who plays a college student from Kyiv, last performed in “Fiddler on the Roof” at Pentacle Theatre in 1971.

Back then, he played an unnamed townsperson and he doesn’t recall having microphones. At the time, the Civil Rights Movement was in full swing and Iran-Contra was over a decade away. 

He said the play has stayed relevant, and balances humor with serious themes of religious and cultural discrimination.

“Every time has its cultural and moral questions,” Herzog said. 

Tom Ogren, who’s playing a hat maker, said it’s been fun to step back in time to 20th century Russia. The play also challenged him to read sheet music for the first time in 40 years.

But the major draw, for Ogren, who’s 81, was the community. Beyond residents, staff have gotten involved in sewing costumes and students from Howard Street Charter School are volunteering as stagehands.

“This is the very first production I’ve ever been in,” Ogren said. “It’s just a whole lot of fun. Just to get a chance to sing a little bit, and kind of act funny. It’s good to associate with some people that you probably wouldn’t otherwise. It just kind of brings everybody together.”

The first two performances took place the week of March 17, with two more to come the week of the 24th. 

The play begins with the sound of a fiddle over the speakers, as Van Otten dances down the aisle, leading the ensemble in through the back doors, prop fiddle held aloft. 

Before joining the play, Van Otten said she spent a lot of time in her home. Her husband died two years ago, and she sat in her grief for a long time.

“I decided I was just going to expand my horizons a little. And I think we can say that of a lot of people here. ‘Oh, I could never do that,’ turns into ‘Hey, this might be fun.’”

As the fiddler, Van Otten also closes the play. 

“They get kicked out of their village. At the end, (Tevye) motions to me, and it’s supposed to be: are we taking our traditions along with us to America, or wherever we’re going? And then he motions to me, and I march out after him with my fiddle under my arm.”

Johansen said the first shows were to a full house, and received a standing ovation.

“People were coming up to the different cast members and saying ‘This is the best thing that’s ever been at Capital Manor,’” she said. “Somebody said, ‘You were all so good, I forgot that I was watching my neighbors and friends.’”

There’s a handful of popular plays available for seniors, including “The Music Man,” a favorite of Votaw’s. He said that it’s possible that “Fiddler on the Roof” could be the first and last play Capital Manor undertakes.

“We can’t say. I don’t know if anyone will survive this. My wife has already said ‘Never again,’” Votaw said, and laughed.

Contact reporter Abbey McDonald: [email protected] or 503-575-1251.

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