Princess Bride Actor to Ted Cruz: Stop Quoting the Film
MANDY PATINKIN DOESN'T THINK CRUZ GETS THE POINT OF THE FILM: LOVE, NOT REVENGE
By Jenn Gidman, Newser Staff
newser.com
Posted Dec 15, 2015 7:39 AM CST
(NEWSER) – To Mandy Patinkin, it's inconceivable that Ted Cruz has been uttering lines from The Princess Bride along the campaign trail—and the actor, who played Inigo Montoya in the 1987 cult film, has had enough. "How can I stop this?" was Patinkin's reaction when friends started emailing him about images online that featured Cruz's face Photoshopped onto his character's body, he tells the New York Times. Cruz has long said the movie is his favorite, and he's committed a good portion of it to memory (including Patinkin's famous line: "Allo, my name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die"). But Patinkin isn't sure Cruz understands the film's subtext: namely that, despite the film focusing partly on his character's mission for vengeance, the real meaning revolves around the movie's hero rescuing his true love.
"[Cruz] is not putting forth ideas that are at the heart of what that movie is all about," Patinkin tells the Times in a tone the paper describes as "increasingly vexed." Patinkin cites one of his character's final lines in the movie as one that should stand out more to Cruz: "I have been in the revenge business so long, now that it's over, I don't know what to do with the rest of my life."
The 63-year-old actor's beef with Cruz is that he's too focused on that revenge, preying on voter anxiety by, as the Times puts it, "exploiting fears about immigrants and Muslims." Says Patinkin, "Open your arms to these people, these refugees trying to get into our country, and open your hearts." A spokeswoman for Cruz's campaign told the Times in an email that "having some fun with a cult classic … should be something we can all get behind, politics aside." In other words, no "as you wish" from Cruz. (Will Cruz pull out a Princess Bride quote during Tuesday night's debate?) |
