Mandy Patinkin's Family Secrets Inspired Him to Take on Bombshell Brilliant Minds Role: 'It Made Lying a Cancer to Me' (Exclusive)

Warning: This story contains spoilers from the January 6 season finale Brilliant minds.

When Mandy Patinkin walked into rehearsals for his guest role on the NBC medical drama Brilliant mindshe also returned to the past, to the history of his own family.

Directed by Michael Grassi, the procedural is loosely based on the real life of Oliver Sacks, a neurologist who was one of the first to research mental health. Just like the main character of the series, dr. Oliver Wolf (Zachary Quinto), Sacks was motivated to pursue a career in this field by the fact that a member of his immediate family struggled with mental illness, and this was treated as a big secret.

“Oliver Sacks then devoted his life to writing about these things, talking about them and listening: all these things that are so important to Brilliant minds,” Grassi tells PEOPLE. “We’re kind of trying to pass that torch forward.”

The series follows dr. Wolf, who takes on a new neurological case each episode, along with his interns Van (Alex MacNicoll), Eric (Ashleigh LaThrop), Jacob (Spence Moore II) and Dan (Aury Krebs). A doctor with prosopagnosia, or face blindness, also begins a romance with neurosurgeon Dr. Josh Nichols (Teddy Sears) and struggles with the death of his father, who has struggled with mental illness his entire life.

Mandy Patinkin as Dr. Noah Wolf (left) and Donna Murphy as Dr. Muriel Landon in ‘Brilliant Minds’.

Rafy/NBC

In the last two episodes Brilliant minds‘ in the first season, Patinkin guest stars as a bombshell. After helping dr. Wolf et al. Nichols during a terrifying building collapse, he discovers that Wolf’s father is alive and well, more than 20 years after his son believed him dead.

Patinkin tells PEOPLE Grassi called him about the role while sitting in a chair he “inherited” from his time Country. After quickly asking to put it on speaker so Patinkin’s longtime wife, Kathryn Grody, could hear — “because she’s my boss,” the actor says — Grassi got to work explaining the show’s concept and the pivotal role of Wolf’s father.

“My wife kept looking at me and raising her eyebrows. She was like, ‘You should pay attention. You have an interesting relationship with your sons. You might find this interesting,'” Patinkin recalls of that first conversation, referring to their sons, Isaac and Gideon.

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Then he got the pilot from Grassi, since the final episodes hadn’t been written yet, and he remembers thinking it was so “nice” for the first episode. The pilot also touched Patinkin as it featured a moving performance by André De Shields who The princess bride actor saw in a play in his teenage years, just as he was bitten by the acting bug.

Kathryn Grody and Mandy Patinkin at the ‘Homeland’ season eight premiere at the Museum of Modern Art on February 4, 2020 in New York City.

Monica Schipper/Getty

As for Grassi, he couldn’t imagine another actor in the role. “I’d say Mandy was the only person we envisioned and talked to in the writing room when she was originally pitching the show,” he says. “When I suggested to Zachary what his story would be for the season, I said, ‘At the end of the season, Dad comes in and imagine it’s Mandy Patinkin.’ ”

Before digging too deep into the character, who eventually makes Wolf question all of his relationships after realizing he’s been lied to for years, Patinkin says he wanted the relationship to be “hopeful.”

“I want it to be filled with life, love and goodness. I don’t want to dig up landfills that poison the land of their souls,” he remembers telling Grassi.

Soon, however, as Patinkin’s own history caught up with him, this dream seemed out of reach. “I thought I could do it, but I couldn’t. I would break down all the time because of the things that as a parent you can’t help but think about, ‘Did I screw up? Did I hurt my child like this? Did I hurt my wife?’ Patinkin recalls.

BRILLIANT MINDS – Zachary Quinto as Dr. Oliver Wolf, Mandy Patinkin as Dr. Noah Wolf.

Rafy/NBC

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As they got deeper into rehearsals and filming, the scenes where Wolf’s parents’ lies come to light “hit a nerve” for Patinkin, revealing two family secrets and deep emotions he couldn’t ignore.

One memory that kept nagging at him was the big revelation he got about Henry Louis Gates Jr Searching for your roots 2021 At the urging of his son Gideon, Patinkin goes on the show and learns a big family secret that changes the way he views his origins.

“My generation was told that we didn’t lose anyone in the Holocaust, but the show revealed that there were many, and they named me,” he says. “They did it all on camera for five and a half hours, and I kept losing it.”

Patinkin remembers being completely blindsided by the bomb and thinking to his family members, “How could you not share that with us?”

Mandy Patinkin as Dr. Noah Wolf in ‘Brilliant Minds’.

Rafy/NBC

Mandy Patinkin cries as he tells fans the emotional story behind his iconic song ‘Princess Bride’

Similar to u Brilliant mindsPatinkin thinks those secret keepers felt they were doing the right thing. He adds of his own family experience: “They did it for many reasons: to protect us, to keep it from themselves, and on and on.”

Going into character for a medical procedure also triggered Patinkin’s own memories of his sick father, who was diagnosed with cancer but was told by everyone, including his doctor, that it was actually hepatitis. Many were afraid that he could not accept the news and everyone played with lies.

“My dad wasn’t an idiot. It didn’t take him more than five minutes to realize this wasn’t hepatitis,” Patinkin says. “I lied to everyone else. And you can never get back that time to be with your father in any way you can imagine. That lie made me a cancer, worse than any cancer there is.”

Michael Grassi (left) and Zachary Quinto at Warner Bros. Television Group and Fenty Beauty Fall TV Season Party at nya WEST Studios on October 10, 2024 in Los Angeles, California.

Michael Buckner/Variety via Getty

Grassi agrees and says he’s a major part of bringing it on Brilliant minds on the screen it was about telling the truth and “talking to each other and listening to each other.”

In the end, it seems Patinkin’s wife, Grody, was on to something, and the guest starring role did indeed end up being an “interesting journey” that was “beneficial” to the actor’s work and personal healing.

In the end, Grassi was impressed with Patinkin’s commitment to the story and his performance.

“I’ve been in this business for a while and your dreams don’t always come true. But sometimes they do and you get to work with someone like Mandy,” he says. “It makes me say, meet your heroes because this was an amazing experience.”

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Brilliant minds can be streamed on Peacock.

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Source: HIS Education