At Asolo Repertory Theatre in Sarasota, 16-year-old Andrii Padkovskyi and his 21-year-old brother, Yurri, greet each other in Ukrainian before a rehearsal of "Fiddler on the Roof."
For decades before the war with Russia, Sarasota County has been a hub for Ukrainians. With help from a family friend, Andrii and his mother moved to Venice three years ago. Yurri followed soon after.
But the one thing they could not leave behind was their instruments. Andrii plays the violin, and Yurri the clarinet.
Before joining the show, the brothers knew little about "Fiddler on the Roof," which centers on Tevye, a poor milkman and his family living in Czarist Russia.
The show highlights universal themes of tradition and change, generational conflict and oppression.
The musical is set in a fictional Jewish village called Anatevka, which would be in present-day Ukraine. But for Andrii, this story of families forced to leave their homes is a familiar one.
"When the war started, I was going to school, but teacher called every student and said, 'Don't go to school,' ” he said. “It's very dangerous to go outside.”
Andrii was 13 when the bombs started to fall. At the time, Yurri was studying music at a university in the Czech Republic along with their oldest brother.
"We woke up like at 5 a.m., and we were terrified at the time,” he said. “I was just checking news, 24/7. I was calling everybody I know in Ukraine."
Peter Rothstein, Asolo Rep's producing artistic director, discovered Andrii at the Sarasota Orchestra's Young Artists Competition.
And then he learned Andrii's backstory.
"And I thought, 'How poignant would it be for the Fiddler who is the central metaphor of our story,to be from the same piece of Earth in which the story was set, that the Jews became refugees,' " he said.
"Fiddler on the Roof" premiered at the Imperial Theater on Broadway in September 1964; that production ran for a record 3,242 performances and won nine Tony Awards.
Both Padkovskyi brothers say there are parts of the story that especially resonate.
For Yurri, it's when Tevye's middle daughter, Hodel, prepares to leave her family for Siberia to join her husband.
"And she say, 'We'll never see you again, my father.' So, for me, I didn't see my father for almost five years, and I think this is the most heartbreaking thing to me," he said.
Andrii said the song that most hits home for him is the musical's final number, "Anatevka," where a Russian constable tells the villagers to pack all their belongings and go.
“They say you have three days to leave your houses, sell them and leave,” he said. “For me, it was the same as the day the war started. They just came to my countr; it kind of was, like, you have only a few days to leave."
Three years into their new lives, the Padkovskyi brothers say they’re grateful to be here.
And for Asolo director Peter Rothstein, that's another parallel to "Fiddler on the Roof," which ends with Tevye's family leaving for America.
“There's something incredibly relevant and current about the world we live in now,” he said. “We have more refugees on the planet than ever before."
The UN Refugee Agency said that at the end of 2024 more than 120 million people around the world were forcibly displaced.
At the end of "Fiddler on the Roof," the soon-to-be refugees face an unknown future.
But for the brothers, the path is clearer.
Andrii will finish his sophomore year of high school in Venice. And Yurri will begin a new fellowship at the Juilliard School of Music.
"Fiddler on the Roof" is playing at Asolo Repertory Theatre in Sarasota through May 24.
