Quesstion about comparing Fiddler on the Roof versions

The new Broadway version of Fiddler on the Roof made a big deal about not having the actors do the fake Yiddish accents like the classic versions did. And actually that is a more intellectually sound way to go, as these characters are undoubtedly speaking Russian and not English with a New York Jewish nasal tone. But the play bombed. Any opinions as to whether the accent decision was a big factor? I think it was.

And why in the HECK do community theater productions insist on casting Tevye and Golde as plump, when the text specifically mentions them starving over the period of twenty five years, which I would think was enough to slightly emaciate any woman no matter how badly she wanted the lead in a musical. I stuffed myself, but admittedly part of their decision was that I was too thin. I got cast as Grandma Tzeitel, who had been dead for thirty years. Oy vey.