Veteran actor Mandy Patinkin and his wife, Kathryn Grody, had the Internet in tears on Wednesday after the Tony Award winner connected with a fan over processing grief. A TikTok user named Amanda Webb posted a video where she explained that her father had recently died of cancer and that she had heard a rumor that Patinkin had channeled his own sorrow over the death of his father into his role in The Princess Bride. Webb explained that she had heard that while delivering one of Inigo Montoya’s iconic lines — “I want my father back, you son of a b—-” — during his duel with Christopher Guest’s villainous Count Rugen, Patinkin was thinking of his own father, who had died right before he began filming the cult classic film.
Webb explained that The Princess Bride was a very important film to her and to her father, so she was hoping that Patinkin, who is fairly active on the app, could confirm this. Patinkin, who is visibly moved by Webb’s video plea, confirmed that that was indeed the case. “It is true — 100 percent true,” Patinkin replied in his video response. “I went outside in this castle and walked around. And I kept talking to my dad and I said, ‘Dad, I’m going to get this guy.'”
@mandypatinktok @alaska_webb thank you for finding us and sharing this! ✨ Sending big love and light to you and yours. More in comments. ##grieving ##cancer ##dads
“From the minute I read the script I knew… I said, ‘I’m going to do this part because in my mind if I get the six-fingered guy [Count Rugen], that means I kill the cancer that killed my dad, and I’ll get to visit my dad,'” Patinkin explained. He also revealed that he had a beautiful moment of peace after filming that particular scene. “And I went and I played that scene with Chris, and then I went back out there and talked to my dad. You could talk to your dad anytime you want, anywhere you want.” Patinkin also asked Webb for her father’s name so that he can add him to his prayer list.
Patinkin has spoken about his personal connection with this particular scene from The Princess Bride a number of times. In an interview with NPR in 2012, he admitted that he never tired of the public’s love affair with the film and his line “Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.” in particular. He called filming The Princess Bride some of the best days of his life, and remembered filming the particular scene in question vividly. “I would walk through the maze of the gardens while I was just trying to relax or while they were lighting the scene, and I was talking to my father, who had died not that many years before we made the film, and I always had it in my mind that if I could get the six fingered man, if Inigo could get the six fingered man, then my father, Mandy’s father, would come back and be with me,” he said.