Fans of Mandy Patinkin's show-tune-lovin' character on Chicago Hope might find it hard to believe the actor would actually pass on an opportunity to sing. But the Broadway veteran did indeed back out of discussions with Disney to give voice to Quasimodo in its 1996 animated musical The Hunchback of Notre Dame. ''I wanted to play [him] for real, and they wanted a Disney version, so I pulled out,'' says Patinkin.
The actor thought he'd lost his one opportunity to play Victor Hugo's tragic hero, when lo and behold, TNT offered him the starring role in its $8 million live-action adaptation, The Hunchback (airing March 16, 8 p.m.). Patinkin, thrilled to have his hump dreams realized, agreed to star before even reading a script. Director Peter Medak (Romeo Is Bleeding) needed more convincing. ''I don't quite believe in remaking things which were great,'' he says of the 1939 Charles Laughton version (one of nine, including TV adaptations). But news that Patinkin would be his star changed Medak's mind. ''I think Mandy's a very serious, obsessive actor. And [the part] needed an actor rather than a personality -- someone who could bury himself in the role.''
In this case, the burying was done under layers of latex. To put on Quasimodo's half-melted face, Patinkin spent more than two hours each day in the makeup chair, often beginning as early as 4 a.m. ''It served my preparation in a funny way,'' says Patinkin. ''You go into another world, which is actually very Quasimodo-like.''
Scenes requiring a full-figure Quasimodo, however, were decidedly less Zen. For these Patinkin had to don a torso bodysuit -- a six-hour-plus process, beginning with a complete upper-body wax (''Any woman who puts herself through that is out of her f -- -ing mind,'' he says). Once the lightweight suit was glued in place, the actor was trapped in it for 14 hours or more. Ninety-degree Hungarian heat (the movie was shot in Budapest last summer) combined with Patinkin's unusually active sweat glands led to rapid makeup meltdown. ''After [each] shot we were there touching up,'' says Hunchback makeup artist David White. ''It was like a pit stop at a car race.''
Despite weeks of weight training to prepare himself for 43 days of hunched-over lurching, Patinkin ended up a big ball of hurt. ''Every evening a chiropractor had to adjust his back,'' says Medak. But it was emotion, not pain, that reduced Patinkin to tears on the last day of shooting. ''I wept because I was so grateful to have walked in this guy's shoes,'' he says. ''And [because] I lived.''
