Hopefully, Mandy Patinkin's new 50-city tour, which hits Abravanel Hall Thursday, will be less rocky than the start of his 2001 tour.
Last year's tour began with a concert on Sept. 10 in the Neil Simon Theatre in New York City. "I ended the evening with a prayer for peace," Patinkin said during a telephone interview. "The next day I was up on my rooftop watching the world change."
The concert tour went on, but Patinkin revised the ending to be a prayer for peace for the entire world, not just the Middle East.
He's also softened, somewhat, a Rodgers and Hammerstein song he'll sing near the finale — "You've Got to Be Carefully Taught," which he feels carries an especially meaningful message today. In his earlier tour, he took a strong, almost melodramatic approach, but Salt Lakers will see him performing it as a lullaby.
"It's much less intense," he said.
Patinkin's all-Broadway concert this week comes to Salt Lake City under the auspices of Clear Channel's "Broadway in Utah" series.
When he's on the road, Patinkin has three different concert programs — the one he's doing here showcases a cross-section of several Broadway composers, while the others are all-Sondheim and all-Yiddish. He also joined with Patty Lupone recently for a fourth concert, which debuted as part of the opening of a new theater in Richardson, Texas; he calls it "The Patty-Mandy Show."
Locally, Patinkin is probably best-known through his nearly 20 films and a half-dozen or so television performances, including his Emmy Award-winning role on "Chicago Hope." But his first love is the stage. And his concerts "are very family oriented," he said. "It's a good, clean show, and you can bring your kids. I never leave the stage without quoting my 'Princess Bride' line."
Younger audiences know it by heart: "My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father; prepare to die!"
Patinkin said he grew up in Chicago, where "I was a singer in a boys choir in my synagogue, then I tried acting at the local youth center, and I fell in love with it there."
He studied theater, including classical drama, at Julliard. He was featured in new recordings of "Follies" (1985) and "South Pacific" (1986). He then hit it big on the charts with two back-to-back solo albums, "Mandy Patinkin" in 1989 and "Dress Casual" the next year.
(His most recent recording, 2001's "Kidults," is a collection of 16 tunes, ranging from children's favorites — a "School Days" medley, "If I Only Had a Brain" and "The Ugly Duckling," among others — with a smattering of Broadway tunes and others. His rendition of "The Ugly Duckling" is reminiscent of Danny Kaye's performance in "Hans Christian Andersen" and the "Holiday for Strings" cut has a definite Spike Jones influence.)
Another album — a live recording of his new "Celebrating Sondheim" concert — should be in stores soon. The recording's title is "Mandy Patinkin Sings Sondheim," but it's the same as the show.
Patinkin leans heavily toward Sondheim in his concerts. "He is the Shakespeare of our time," he says.
Patinkin should know. He's connected to both Sondheim and Shakespeare on stage — from "Sunday in the Park With George" (which earned him a Tony nomination) to roles in "A Winter's Tale," "Henry IV, Part 1" and "Hamlet."
All of Patinkin's concerts have one thing in common — his longtime accompanist Paul Ford. Most of the time there's no orchestra. Just Patinkin singing and Ford at the keyboard. "He's my hands and my brain. It's the old mirror brain — you don't know who's leading. I couldn't do my concerts without him."
For his Broadway pops concert in Abravanel Hall, patrons can expect some between-songs banter, and Ford will be playing on an upright piano. (Patinkin's Sondheim concert is a little more formal — Ford uses a grand piano for that, and there's no talking. His Yiddish concert uses the upright piano, and no talking.)
Patinkin filmed a "Touch by an Angel" segment in Salt Lake City last year. He just filmed the pilot for a possible new series in Vancouver, British Columbia. And he will be doing the stage version of "Enemy of the People" next year in Williamstown.
What: Mandy Patinkin
Where: Abravanel Hall
When: 8 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 10.
Cost: $27.50-$42.50
Phone: 355-2787
Web site: www.broadwayacrossamerica.com/saltlake/www.arttix.org
E-mail: ivan@desnews.com