Yidl mitn fidl

Fascinating film. A sly comedy with terrific music has Molly Picon posing as a boy (for safety) and traveling the countryside with her father after they have been dispossessed. As musicians, they meet up with a pair of wanderers and the four strike up some merry music and get involved in various situations, including a wedding and a theater.

Picon is no more convincing as a boy than were Marion Davies or Barbra Streisand in various films, but you suspend your disbelief and go with the flow. Picon is a major comic talent and also had a nice singing voice. Also good in the cast as Simche Fostel as her father, Max Bozyk as Izak, and Leon Liebgold as Froim. Dora Fakiel is funny as the widow Trauba.

Joseph Green wrote, produced, and directed this film, shooting in Poland in 1935/36. The film has almost a documentary feel at times, capturing the look and sounds of rural Poland before the German invasion in 1939. It's a world long gone. Green filmed three more movies up through 1938 and escaped Poland with his films and returned to America.

YIDDLE WITH HIS FIDDLE was certainly a low-budget affair, but it was a worldwide hit in its day, especially in New York City where its box office clout rivaled that of any Hollywood film of the day.

Highlights of the film are the wedding party scene and Picon's musical turn on a theater stage after she has ditched the boy's disguise. The film is available from several sources and has English subs.

In a final and sad note, Green never made another film after 1938. He said he gave up filmmaking because his audience was gone. He was referring to the Holocaust and the extermination of 6 million Jews.