by Ron Kaplan
NJJN Features Editor

July 21, 2009

Deborah Murad knows she has some mighty big shoes to fill when she takes to the stage as Fanny Brice in a production of Funny Girl at the Axelrod Performing Arts Center beginning Aug. 12.

It’s a role she’s yearned to play “since I was a little girl,” she told NJ Jewish News in a telephone interview.

“There aren’t that many female vehicle roles,” said Murad, who has played such characters as Gloria in Damn Yankees, Marian in The Music Man, and Hodel in Fiddler on the Roof, among others, but in Funny Girl, Murad gets to shine. “You’ve got 10 songs, you’re constantly on stage, constantly speaking. It’s definitely one of the bigger roles available for a female.”

Although she has seen the 1968 Streisand film several times, “I try not to watch it at this point,” she said; she wants to craft her own vision of the award-winning role. Streisand also appeared in the 1964 Broadway production, which received eight Tony Award nominations.

Murad studied opera and “had a little detour and went to law school” but later returned to theater, both on a professional and community level.

She has a two-and-a-half-year-old son. He “sort of” knows what mom is doing. “I have to teach him the music in order for him to accept that we listen to it and practice. He knows his share of musical theater.”

The role of Fanny Brice is especially compelling for Murad. “Having an opportunity like this to play a part that doesn’t come around often is really something exciting.”

Murad lives in Manhattan but spends most of her summers in Deal.

As a Jew, the role takes on special significance for the 30-year-old Murad.

“There’s a certain affection and connection for a Jewish character like Fanny Brice. There are certainly other Jewish characters in musical theater, but this one is just there, it’s blatant. You have the Jewish mother concept working in there, you’ve got her own struggle with getting married, all things that resonate with me personally. There’s a certain warmth with the character that feels familiar.”

She admits to feeling a certain amount of intimidation in following in the footsteps of a legend like Streisand, both in the musical and Jewish worlds. “It’s something that if you don’t acknowledge then you’re probably going to disappoint people. You have to sometimes bend a little bit to reflect what she did, too, because she did create the character. She approached it as a show, as a character, which it is because it doesn’t really reflect the truth of Fanny Brice’s life. Part of the reason that she was cast was something that came from within her and that’s always going to be infused into the character that we know. Of course, I’m intimidated; who wouldn’t be?”

But Murad is confident that the work of the creative staff in this production will hold its own. “Definitely we’ll do our best to rise to that challenge.”

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