From bima to stage: Cantor stars in 'Les Miz'
By Michael Elkin

NEW YORK - He is a new Broadway star with a story worthy of Hollywood. For his theatrical debut, David (Dudu) Fisher, the Tel Aviv-born cantor-cum-performer, snagged the lead role of Jean Valjean in Les Miserables, the multi-award-winning musical based on the Victor Hugo novel of the same name. He'll play the role for the next six months. Even as he enters a new stage in his life on Broadway, Fisher is not abandoning the bima. "I still am a cantor," he says, adding that he performs at Kutscher's in Monticello, NY, during the High Holy Days and has served as cantor at such Israeli sites as the Great Synagogue of Tel Aviv. "'Cheech' keeps hocking me not to leave cantorial music," chuckles Fisher over the nudges he gets from Tel Aviv Mayor Shlomo Lahat, whom he counts as a mentor. 'Cheech' has done incredible good for cantorial music. He really pushed me. In a way, my work in cantorial music is a tribute to him." Not that Fisher lacked guidance - one mentor was his grandfather whom the performer describes as "half-rabbi, half-cantor, who ran the synagogue in Petah Tikva," where Fisher now calls home . "All the basics I know of music I learned from him," says the singer. Fisher has been hailed as one of Israel's acclaimed cantors, taking top prizes in the competitive Hassidic Festival and the Festival of Jerusalem, among other honors garnered throughout the years. He also captured the hearts of critics and audiences at concert performances all over the country but it was a trip away from his homeland that helped Fisher make it to the Great White Way. "I was visiting my sister in London, and everywhere I heard these songs in the hotel, on the street - everywhere," recalls Fisher of that sojourn in 1986. Told that the music was from a hit show then in London, Fisher decided to see and hear for himself. He bought a ticket to Les Miz and was held spellbound by its story of operatic proportions. Scheduled to return to Israel, he kept postponing the trip. "Every night I kept going to the theater to see the show from the moment the curtain went up. I cried. It was the most amazing show as was the whole theatrical experience," relates Fisher. After all, I am a yeshiva bucher - I never knew what the back of a theater looked like. In the yeshiva, they taught you that life can be very good without ever knowing Victor Hugo." Fisher bought the novel, studying it, as well as other Les Miz material. "When I finally returned home to Israel, my daughter, who was three, got hold of a souvenir program from Les Miserables, opened it and said, 'Look - it's you Daddy!'" And Fisher agreed. But could others see him a cantor/performer who had never starred on a stage before in the part? It didn't matter, Fisher could. My manager told me that the show was coming to Israel. I told him to get me an audition. At the audition ("I was number thirteen," he smiles), Fisher's rendition of the musical's 'Bring Him Home' brought him the approval that comes with stunned silence. "By the time I walked home to my apartment - a five-minute walk - the phone was ringing," recalls Fisher. Fisher had stepped out of the shadows into the spotlight. He was offered the lead, taking the role originally intended for someone else. "It was the most beautiful experience I ever had," recalls Fisher of his Tel Aviv theatrical debut. Not that everyone was convinced that the cantor from Petah Tikva could do it all. "They talked [about] me going for acting classes, but [director] Steven Pimlott told those in the Tel Aviv company. 'Don't touch him. I want him as is.' Fisher performed as Jean Valjean more than 600 times. When producer Cameron Mackintosh put together an international cast of Les Miserables for a command performance before the Queen of England in 1989, he chose Fisher as his Valjean. Fisher doesn't have to choose between roles as cantor and actor. In a way, they're commingled, he says. "To be a cantor is also to be an actor;" he says. "But when you finish your service as cantor, there is no applause. That is hard to deal with," he says good-naturedly. At the bima or on Broadway, Fisher doesn't have to make choices between the secular and religious. According to an arrangement with the producers, the Orthodox cantor will not be performing during Shabbat. "This time of year was chosen for my engagement here because it will not interfere with any Jewish holidays," says Fisher. "My six months end just before Passover." His Broadway debut "is a shock for a lot of people," he says with a laugh, "including my wife and parents and some fans. I was very famous among certain people in Israel," says Fisher of the religious section of the country that covets his recordings of Yiddish and Hassidic works. "But the non-religious people don't know my name." Now that he is making a name for himself in theater, maybe all that will change. On the other hand, "When I started doing Les Miserables in Tel Aviv, the hassids felt that I left them." To prove that wasn't the case, "After three years in Les Miz, I recorded another Hassidic record," he notes. Fisher says the character that has brought him to the edge of fame is also a man of faith. "Jean Valjean is a religious man," notes the cantor. "He prays a lot. So do I." Will Fisher remain in New York or return to Israel? "A lot of friends are afraid that I will not go back," he says. "Ezer Weizman called me to congratulate me on the role - and to remind me to return to Israel when I'm done." Some things about the future are more certain than others. "My son, who will be 17, will be going into the army next year," says Fisher. "When I was here in New York...the day the peace treaty between Israel and the PLO was signed, I was entertaining at a dinner party for an executive of the Shubert theater clan," recalls Fisher. "I saw the TV peace treaty ceremony, then took a walk in New York. I was crying and I didn't know why." He spied a sign advertising Les Miz, with a larger-than-life cutout of the character of Gavroche, which Fisher's son had played opposite him in Tel Aviv. "I started thinking about 'Bring Him Home,' the [show's anti-war] song I had sung some 1,500 times on stage and in concert. Well, in Israel that song has a special significance, unlike elsewhere in the world. And, with my son soon to go into the army, I realized why I had been crying."

Jewish News, November 1993