Joanna Merlin obit

Joanna Merlin Dies: Original ‘Fiddler On The Roof’ Tzeitel, Longtime Judge On ‘Law & Order: SVU’ Was 92

 

He was not on the list.

Joanna Merlin, whose acting career stretched from Broadway (she was the original Tzeitel in Fiddler On The Roof), film (she played the dance teacher Miss Berg in Alan Parker’s 1980 film Fame) and TV (Law & Order: SVU‘s Judge Lena Petrovsky on dozens of episodes) died Sunday in Los Angeles. She was 92.

Her death was announced on the Instagram page of the New York University Tisch Graduate Acting Program, where Merlin had been on the faculty since 1998.

“Joanna was an actress, master Chekhov teacher, and former casting director for Harold Prince, Stephen Sondheim, Bernardo Bertolucci, and James Ivory,” the NYU message said. “Joanna will be deeply missed at Grad Acting, by the Chekhov community, and by the many people she touched through her artistry.”

As a casting director, Merlin was involved in numerous landmark Broadway productions written by Stephen Sondheim. She was, for many years, Harold Prince’s go-to casting director.

A cause of death was not immediately available.

Born Joann Ratner on July 15, 1931, in Chicago, she would change her name for a show business career that soon would find her performing on Broadway in three notable productions including the original 1960 staging of Becket starring Laurence Olivier and Anthony Quinn and the original 1961 production of A Far Country starring Kim Stanley.

But her breakthrough stage role came in 1964, when she was cast as the eldest daughter of milkman Tevye is what would become a major hit musical. In Fiddler, Merlin played Tzeitel, who, despite her father’s concerns, wishes to marry the poor tailor Motel (originally played by Austin Pendleton). As Tzeitel, Merlin got to sing — along with the actors playing her sisters Hodel and Chava — one of the most well-known and beloved of the show’s musical numbers, “Matchmaker, Matchmaker.”

After her performance in Fiddler, Merlin segued, at least on Broadway, away from performance and to casting. Merlin cast many of Stephen Sondheim’s greatest musicals including Company, Follies, A Little Night Music, Pacific Overtures, Sweeney Todd, Merrily We Roll Along and Into the Woods. She also cast Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Evita and the Betty Comden-Adolph Green-Cy Coleman musical On the Twentieth Century. The majority of Broadway shows cast by Merlin were directed by Prince.

On the screen, Merlin got her start when she was cast as Jethro’s Daughter in Cecil B. DeMille’s epic film The Ten Commandments (1956). Other, usually small, roles in both television and film would come in the 1960s and ’70s (TV’s Naked City, the indie film Hester Street and Bob Fosse’s 1979 All That Jazz.

The following year would bring a more significant role when she memorably played the demanding ballet teacher Miss Olive Berg in Alan Parker’s 1980 film Fame.

She stayed busy both as an actor and casting director in television and film throughout the 1980s, ’90s and well into the new century. Some examples: She was casting director on Year of the Dragon, Big Trouble in Little China, The Last Emperor, Jefferson in Paris and Mr. and Mrs. Bridge.

As an actor, Merlin had guest or small roles in such films as The Killing Fields, Mr. Wonderful and The Wackness, among many others, and on television in Northern Exposure, New York Undercover, All My Children, The Good Wife and Homeland.

But her most widely recognizable role came with the Law & Order franchise. Although she appeared on the original Law & Order series several times in the mid-1990s, it was her role as the tough, no-nonsense Judge Lena Petrovsky in more than 40 episodes of Law & Order: SVU throughout 2000-11 that gave her a late-career signature role.

Merlin began teaching graduate acting at New York University in 1998 and the following founded the Michael Chekhov Association, where she taught acting workshops.

She was preceded in death by husband David Dretzin and is survived by two daughters, the actor Julie Dretzin and documentary film director and producer Rachel Dretzin.

One of Merlin’s students, Broadway’s Julie Benko, who played Fanny Brice in the recent hit Funny Girl on Lea Michele’s days off, posted a tribute to her mentor on Instagram.

“She was beyond kind, supporting me both while in school @nyugradacting and continuing to send warm messages after I’d graduated,” Benko wrote in the message beside a photo of herself and Merlin under the Funny Girl marquee. “Here we were after she came to @funnygirlbwy. I will not forget the breakthrough I had in her class. I will miss her beautiful presence. I am so honored to have been a small part of her life.”

 

Filmography

Film

Year     Title            Role            Notes

1956    The Ten Commandments           Jethro's Daughter         

1958            Weddings and Babies            Josie    

1975    Hester Street   Jake's Landlady         

1979    All That Jazz      Nurse Pierce  

1980    Fame            Miss Berg    

1982    Soup for One            Allan's Mother

1982    Love Child    Mrs. Sturgis 

1983    Baby It's You            Mrs. Rosen  

1984    The Killing Fields            Sydney Schanberg's Sister   

1985    Year of the Dragon            Casting Director           

1986    Big Trouble in Little China   Casting Director           

1987    Prince of Darkness            Bag Lady   

1987    The Last Emperor            Casting Director           

1988    Mystic Pizza    Mrs. Arujo  

1990    Mr. and Mrs. Bridge  Casting Director           

1991    Class Action  Estelle Ward  

1992    The Lover   Casting Director           

1993    Little Buddha            Tibetan Casting: New York   

1993    M. Butterfly            Casting Consultant       

1993    Mr. Wonderful            Loretta

1995            Jefferson in Paris            Casting Director           

1995    Two Bits            Guendolina      

1996            MURDER and Murder            Doris   

1998    City of Angels  Teresa Messinger        

2001    The Jimmy Show            Emily   

2003    Just Another Story            Sadie   

2007    The Invasion            Joan Kaufman         

2008            Beautiful Hills of Brooklyn            Producer, Co-writer and the role of Jesse Sylvester

2008    The Wackness            Grandma Shapiro      

2010    Sarah's Key      Mme. Rainsferd         

2017    Active Adults  Miriam

 

Television

Year     Title            Role            Notes

1960    CBS Repertoire Workshop            Musya            Episode: "The Seven Who Were Hanged"

1962    Naked City      Gloria Werminski            Episode: "King Stanislaus and the Knights of the Round Stable"

1963    The Defenders            Katy Martinez            Episode: "The Bagman"

1964    East Side/West Side            Lucia Lopez            Episode: "It's War, Man"

1967    The Winter's Tale            Paulina            TV movie

1978    The Last Tenant            Mrs. Farelli   TV movie

1980    Nurse            Nan Riley     TV movie

1981    ABC Afterschool Specials            Inez Marin            Episode: "Starstruck"

1982            Another World            Dr. Emily Cole            Soap Opera

Unknown episodes

1983    Jacobo Timerman: Prisoner Without a Name, Cell Without a Number            Unknown        TV movie

1986            Amazing Stories            Marie / Wealthy Lady            Episode: "Gather Ye Acorns"

1989    CBS Schoolbreak Special Marian Rosenberg            Episode: "A Matter of Conscience"

1990    Murder in Black and White   Dr. Bromberg            TV movie

1991    L.A. Law            Assistant District Attorney Ellen Kennedy            Episode: "Pump it up"

1991    A Marriage: Georgia O'Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz            Dolly Stieglitz TV movie

1991    In a Child's Name            Frances Silvano TV movie

1992    Baby Talk            Unknown            Episodes: "Scenes from a Marriage"

1992–1993            Law & Order   Carla Bowman            2 episodes

1993    Love, Honor & Obey: The Last Mafia Marriage            Rose Profaci TV movie

1993            Northern Exposure            Nadine Fleischman            Episode: "Birds of a Feather"

1995            Everyman         Casting Advisor           

1996    The Prosecutors            Unknown        TV movie

1996–1997            New York Undercover            Carmella McNamara            4 episodes

1997    All My Children            Judge Brauer  Soap Opera

Unknown episodes

1994–1998            Law & Order   Deirdre Powell  3 episodes

1999    Black and Blue            Ann Benedetto            TV movie

1999    Witness Protection            Mrs. O'Connor, Cindy's Mother            TV movie

2004    The Jury      Jackie Ochs            Episode: "Too Jung to Die"

2008    The American Experience            Family Member          

2010            Frontline          Herself            Episode: Digital Nation"

2011    The Good Wife            Loni Goslin            Episode: "In Sickness"

2000–2011            Law & Order: Special Victims Unit            Judge Lena Petrovsky            43 episodes

2013            Homeland            Grandma Lois            Episode: "Tin Man Is Down"

 

Stage

Year     Title            Role            Notes

1961    Becket            Gwendolyn     

1961    A Far Country            Replacement Performer        

1964    Fiddler on the Roof            Tzeitel 

1970            Company         Casting Director           

1971    Follies            Casting Director           

1973    A Little Night Music            Casting Director           

1976    Pacific Overtures            Casting Director           

1978    On the Twentieth Century            Casting Director           

1979    Evita            Casting Director           

1979            Sweeney Todd Casting Director           

1981    Merrily We Roll Along            Casting Director           

1982    A Doll's Life            Casting Director           

1987    Into The Woods            Casting Director           

2014            Absence          Helen Bastion