Transcript of "That Regan Woman" Appearance Airdate: August 1, 1998 Click here for additional screen captures. Regan: He was born Mandel, the son of a junk dealer, from the south side of Chicago. How he got from there to the Juilliard school to Broadway to television stardom to the big screen and back home again is quite a story." (Montage of clips.) "You may know him as the object of Barbra Streisand's affection in Yentl, or as the comically vengeful Spanish swashbuckler in Princess Bride. Many of us loved him as the Emmy-Award winning Dr. Jeffrey Geiger in the CBS drama, Chicago Hope. We loved him more when the demands of a weekly series took its toll and he asked to be released from his contract to spend more time with his family. Since then his family and tradition have taken center stage as he travels across the country performing songs in his mother tongue, Yiddish, from his CD Mamaloshen, a collection of theatre songs, past and present, which embrace a rich, musical heritage. It's a pleasure to welcome a good man, multi-talented Mandy Patinkin. Hi! Mandy: Hi. How are you? Regan: I'm fine. And how are you? Mandy: Great. Regan: A good man. A man who put aside a big hit TV series to hang out with his family. Mandy: Yeah, well that was the best thing I ever did. I mean I miss everyone on the show as I've said many times. But it was a watershed event in terms of our family. It's been incredible -- familywise. Regan: How did you make that decision? Mandy: Well, I spent a year away. We did it as an experiment to see if it would work. And it works wonderfully for some people who have families and do a show. And can do it great. The way I work and the number of hours I need to put into my work and put into my family, I just couldn't do both. So my wife and I had regular discussions and we said when the year is over we'll have a family meeting with the kids involved. We made two lists and the list of loss in terms of the family needs was too great. And so we made the decision. Regan: But how did you get so sensible? Because most men, and women, are very selfish and egocentric and narcissistic and "Me first" and "I don't really care" and "my family comes second" and"It's my career..." So what is the root of that in you? Mandy: My wife. Regan: Ah, you married a good woman. Mandy: I did. I married a great woman. Regan: But you're a good man! Mandy: Well, I'm a better man because of her. I was a good stupid person for a long time. And... Regan: She straightened you out? Mandy: Well, she did. She fought very hard for expressing what she felt was the most important thing in terms of this family and what these children need. And then one day it became clear to me that I'd just lost one year with my kids. And I had four years left with one who already has one foot out the door before he's off to college. And six years left with the other--or seven. And I couldn't afford to lose that. Regan: Now you have two boys and their names are? Mandy: Their names are Isaac and Gideon and they're sixteen and twelve. Regan: Great names. Mandy: And I see you have two gorgeous children also. Regan: Yes, the children. We love our children! Now what about your childhood and growing up in Chicago? What was that like? Mandy: What was it like? My God! It was a good time. I grew up on the south side of Chicago. My dad was a junk dealer. My Aunt Ida always says "Please don't say he was a junk dealer. Say he was in the scrap metal business." She never liked the idea that he was a junk dealer. In the same way she would often say--we would look at our names and say "what is the name Patinkin?" And when Grandpa Max came over through Ellis Island they asked him what his name was. And his name in Polish, he came from Sokala (sic?), Poland, and his name was Patinka. And Patinka in Polish, I've been told, means "women's slipper." So I said, "Well, maybe we were in the shoe business." She says, "No, don't you tell people that. Don't say we were in the shoe business." I said "Auntie Ida, what's wrong with being in the shoe business? That's a nice thing." And she said, "No, we're in the junk business." Which is now called the recycling business. So she might prefer that we say we're in the junk business. But every Saturday I'd go, as all the children would go, to the junk yard. And I'd work at the peddler desk. And the peddlers would bring in their junk and Max Lara (sic?) would be there at the peddler desk and he'd send the Kelly tubes systems through. And every day Max would call up no matter what I was doing. And when Joe Lara would come--Max, I don't remember Max's last name, but when Joe Lara, one of the peddlers, would come by with his junk he'd always call up and we'd always give him checks. And except for Joe Lara who always got cash. And Max would get on the phone, "Joe Lara, give him cash." So we gave Joe Lara cash. My uncle was always in the bathroom telling us to keep busy no matter what even if there was nothing to do. My dad took me to the Chicago White Sox game. Every Saturday we went to Comiskey Park. And my life was always at the synagogue. After school every day, I went to Hebrew school five days a week. Saturday, I was a member of the junior congregation in the boy's choir. And then on Sunday we were in Hebrew school again. Regan: And that was when you started singing? Mandy: I sang. I started singing at about seven years old in the boy's choir. It was no big deal to me. Everybody sang. It was, you know, who didn't sing? Regan: Well, that's what's wrong with life now. Not enough people sing. We're going to take a break right now. And when we come back we'll have more with Mandy Patinkin. [commercial break] (Concert footage of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" in Yiddish, with flag behind Patinkin --dressed in black jacket, black khakis, black T-shirt.) Regan: That was a clip of Mandy Patinkin in action performing a song from his CD "Mamaloshen". No what passion you have. Where did that passion come from? Mandy: (smiles) I don't know. Regan: You don't know? Mandy: When I want to say something, I say it. My wife always says I express myself easier when I'm singing than in any other form. Regan: Now talk to me about this. (Holds up Mamaloshen CD.) It's such a beautiful collection. Mandy: Well, it's an amazing little journey that I've been on with it. It's called "Mamaloshen" which means "mother tongue." There's a reason that the American flag is on the album which I'll tell at the end of my little tale, I guess. But about 6-8 years ago, Joseph Papp, a New York theatrical producer who produced shows like "A Chorus Line", a man who is like my father. He signed our wedding certificate at a Jewish wedding. It's called a "katuba" (sic?). Carried my son in at his pinion aben (sic?), which is a ceremony for a first born son where he was brought in on a silver platter surrounded by garlic. I assume the garlic was to keep away from evil spirits. Any way, Joe is a dear friend. He called me up one day and said "would you do a benefit for the Yivo foundation (which is the Yiddish institute in New York)?" I said "Sure, anything." He said, "I need you to sing a song." I said "No problem." He said, "It needs to be in Yiddish." I said, "Joe, I don't know any Yiddish songs." He said, "Well, it's about time you learned them." He sent me over a song and I learned it and it made me feel freer than anything I'd ever sung. And I've always felt freer singing, period, in English than anything else, but this Yiddish was just an amazing release. So I sang it and a little while later I recorded the song with a fellow named Don Byron. It was "Yossel, Yossel." I put it on an album. Joe came over for a dinner. And I said "I want you to hear something." And I played him the song. He looked at me and said, "Mandy you have to do this music. This is your job." I promised him I would. And unfortunately, Joe passed away and he went to heaven. But being the control freak that producer he always was, he produced it from heaven. It was such a daunting task and promise that I made. And I understood the promise and the obvious reasons. But some of the more unobvious I hadn't really understood. But I took every job that I could find over six years, you know to procrastinate, because I didn't know where to begin. I'd never spoke this language. I didn't hear it in my house growing up except occasionally on Wednesdays when my Grandma Celia would come over for dinner and my father would take her into the basement and do her bills. Which we'd never talk about because, God forbid we should know what any of her bills were. Regan: (laughs) A funny place. Mandy: My dad only sang one Yiddish song, which is "Yome, Yome" which I put on the album for sentimental reasons. And then I got together with a guy named Moishe Rosenfeld, who has a Yiddish radio show in New York. And he began to chip away at this Everest-like mountain of material that existed. So that I became less and less intimidated. Eventually, I saw that there were different categories of music: the old Eastern European songs, songs from the Holocaust, songs from the Yiddish theater. And then there was a category missing for me--which was American Jewish composers who came over here from Eastern Europe to assimilate. But never wrote in Yiddish. They wrote Yiddish ideas, i.e. stories about family, journeys, politics, persecution, joy. And I later learned that these Yiddish writers were the teachers for Tin Pan Alley. But guys like Irving Berlin, whose first language was Yiddish, who wrote more American songs than any composer alive never wrote a Yiddish lyric. He wrote Jewish music. When you listen to Irving Berlin, Paul Simon, Leonard Bernstein, Stephen Sondheim, all these guys--Rodgers and Hammerstein, their music sounds as Jewish as any of the music. And the stories are Jewish theme stories about family and journeys, but the words weren't in Yiddish. So finally we decided to translate several of those songs and then the journey became complete to me. And I put the American flag on the cover, because what it became to me, was not just a Jewish story, although certainly it's way Jewish. I'm Jewish and it's in Yiddish. But what really it touched in me is that it is about the immigrant experience. It is about being an American. Because when I made the album I had the same musicians from every other record. And the Asian and the African-American and the Hispanic musicians came up to me afterwards and said we've been on every one of your records. And we don't understand, because why but this was the most "American" album they had ever been a part of. (Interview ends with additional plug by Regan of CD and announcement about Mamaloshen concert dates.)