I'd never read anything by Sholem Aleichem, let alone even heard of him, so I watched with a completely unbiased mind.
The play was taken from his Tevye stories, which is what Fiddler, the Broadway musical was taken from.
I HATED IT!
That being said, I have tried to watch the movie, FIDDLER ON THE ROOF on TCM and I just can't warm to it; not the play nor the music. Part of the reason re the latter, is because some of the songs from that show were played to death, when it was playing on Broadway.
The movie Fiddler on the Roof was my first direct contact with my Jewish roots, age 11. Chaim Topol played the role perfectly, imho. And now, an Orthodox Chabad Chassid myself, I appreciate it even more. It’s not 100% accurate, but Topol gives it a great deal of authenticity, a child of the ‘30s growing up in the British Mandate. I wrote a very good (imho) essay with him as Tevye as my starting point. I recommend Salah Shabati as another example of his work, this time as a Sephardic immigrant from Morocco with many similarities to Tevye.