He Plays the Hero

By WILLIAM R. DOERNER

Seven years ago, Israeli-born cantor DAVID FISHER found the music of Les Miserables so moving that when the curtain fell in a London theater he could barely leave his seat. "I cried," he says. "And I began to think, I have to be there - in this, singing the heroic role of Jean Valjean. " Now the tenor from Petach-Tikva is. He is bringing the crowds to the barricades in the show's New York City production. Fisher, who first learned the role in Hebrew and performed it in Israel, is replaced by a stand-in for the Friday-night and Saturday-matinee shows so he can observe the Sabbath. He is still awed by his onstage identity. "I am a religious man," he says. "But if I could, I would be Valjean." "

"Time International" - December 27, 1993