At the heart of ‘Fiddler’

Probably not. And if you believe that freshness is all, you can safely skip the touring production of “Fiddler’’ that has arrived at the Boston Opera House.

But if what you’re after are the reliable satisfactions of the familiar, if you’re a believer in the value of - dare I say? - tradition, and if you want to see a great actor find subtle new depths in what is, quite literally, the role of a lifetime, then you will find much to treasure in this “Fiddler.’’

There’s no getting around the fact that parts of “Fiddler’’ are shamelessly manipulative. It contains some jokes so bad they make your teeth hurt, and it goes a bit slack in the second act. But “Fiddler’’ has maintained its grip on our heartstrings (and our tear ducts) for so long because it says something true about family, heritage, change, faith, perseverance, and home, in the largest sense of that word.

Of course, the big story with the current revival is the fact that Topol, at 74, is once again tackling the role of Tevye, the Jewish dairyman struggling to cope with the vagaries of fate - and the marital choices of his independent-minded daughters - in a shtetl in czarist Russia in 1905.

Since the Israeli-born actor first stepped into Tevye’s knee-high boots at 29, he has played the role more than 2,500 times, including an Oscar-nominated turn in the 1971 film version. He now looks more like the grandfather than the father of Tevye’s three headstrong daughters. But Topol turns that to his advantage.

In place of the bearish strength his Tevye possessed in his younger days, Topol now endows the character with a vulnerability that makes the events that befall him all the more shattering. Topol still has that remarkable basso profundo, but it does not carry at the same commanding volume it once did. He often slips into a playful falsetto to show Tevye’s prankish side.

This has a downside - Topol sometimes overdoes the mugging - but he is working with a broader emotional palette than he did when he was younger. When Tevye tells his daughter Chava she must not marry outside the faith, Topol delivers it not as a patriarchal command but rather a tearful plea. Later, in a wrenching moment, he drops his cart and topples forward onto his knees, as if the sorrows of life have overcome him.

A ruminative sort, Tevye muses incessantly on the ways of God to man, and engages in an ongoing dialogue with his Maker. “I know, I know,’’ he says to God. “We are the Chosen People. But once in a while, can’t you choose someone else?’’ The septuagenarian Topol makes these conversations with God seem less like piety and more like bantering between two old men.

“Fiddler’’ revolves around the clash between the tradition-bound older generation and the assertive younger generation, who are armed with new ideas about the proper balance of power between parent and child. The father-knows-best ways of Tevye are upended by each of his three eldest daughters, with each challenge more paradigm-shaking than the last.

Topol is abetted by a strong supporting cast. Susan Cella finds the humor and pathos in Tevye’s dour wife Golde, and the actresses playing the daughters - Tzeitel (Rena Strober), Hodel (Jamie Davis), and Chava (Deborah Grausman) - give them distinctive personalities, which is not always the case with “Fiddler.’’ Mary Stout seems a bit young to play Yente, but she amusingly conveys the matchmaker’s unsinkable bombast.

Director Sammy Dallas Bayes has reproduced the original choreography by Jerome Robbins, and the ensemble responds with consistently dynamic dancing. The classic songs are winningly performed: “Matchmaker, Matchmaker,’’ “Tradition,’’ “If I Were a Rich Man,’’ “Sunrise, Sunset.’’ (If you can listen to “Sunrise, Sunset’’ without getting choked up, check your pulse, because you are apparently dead.)

By the end, having been driven from their village by a pogrom, Tevye and his family are heading for a new world. They will persevere. But Topol’s weary final trudge - and the plangent notes consistently sounded by this “Fiddler’’ - make it clear how much has been lost.

Don Aucoin can be reached at aucoin@globe.com.