Developing “Yentl”

Yentl was Barbra Streisand’s thirteenth film in Hollywood, and her most personal and passionate one yet. It took Barbra many years to finally get Yentl made, and it also marked her debut as a film director. The milestones of making this film are presented below in date order.

1962

“Yentl The Yeshiva Boy,” a short story by Isaac Bashevis Singer, is published. 

JANUARY 1968

Holding the “Yentl” film option, producer Valentine Sherry sends Barbra Streisand an English translation of the short story. After reading it, Barbra decides to portray Yentl on film in her next movie. She options the film right in late 1968. 

Streisand remembered “I just fell in love with it instantly. [My agent] thought I shouldn't do two ethnic pieces — playing one Jewish girl [Fanny Brice in Funny Girl], and now one Jewish boy — in a row.” 

1969

Singer writes first “Yentl” screenplay, a 200-page “long short story,” according to Barbra. “It wasn't quite cinematic enough,” she stated. “His short story had a very different emphasis on the characters and the point of view of women. Singer is a known misogynist as well … the character of Hadass, for example, is a beautiful but dumb girl. She remains dumb. In my film, I wanted to say that a woman can be complete, can be beautiful, can be feminine, can be sensuous, can be a homemaker, a cook, raise children, but also have a mind — be bright, be smart, have opinions, et cetera,” Streisand continued. 

She further explains the changes she wanted to make to Singer’s original characters: “The character of Yentl, when she is asked by Avigdor in the last scene, ‘Are you a man or are you a woman?’ she responds, ‘I’m neither.’ And that was not a story I was interested in telling … the story of a eunuch, a non-sexual person.” 

Meanwhile, Streisand tells her then-agent David Begelman, “I just found my next film. I must do this movie.” Begelman tells Sherry that Streisand is not interested.

1971-1975

Barbra’s First Artists production company announces that the film “Masquerade” will be based on “Yentl the Yeshiva Boy,” with Streisand starring, Sherry producing, Ivan Passer directing, and Singer and Passer screenwriting. A screenplay is drafted by Jerome Kass (he wrote the book for the stage musical “Ballroom”). 

Streisand explained that the movie “wasn’t a musical at the time either. I wasn't going to direct it, or produce it, or write, or anything. I was just going to be an actress. Ivan Passer was the director. I had seen a little film that he made called ‘I Lightning,’ a 78-minute film, I remember, a wonderful Czech film. They were going to film this picture in Yugoslavia, and a script was written then by Jerome Kass — very interesting script. Ivan thought that I was too old at the time and too famous, but the producer wanted me, so it was like I was being shoved down his throat. I felt terrible about it, because I thought I could play the part. He backed out of the project to do another movie, I think, called ‘Born To Lose.’”

Streisand, at this time, saw the film as an independent movie or foreign movie and even mentioned that the Jewish-themed black and white film “Hester Street” (1975) was an inspiration. Her agent, Sue Mengers, “was always against ‘Yentl,’” Streisand offered to Mengers biographer Brian Kellow. “She would say, ‘How can you play this? … You’re going to play a boy?’”

In succeeding years screenplays are also drafted by others, including playwright Leah Napolin, whose play, “Yentl,” starring Tovah Feldshuh runs on Broadway in 1975. Director Milos Forman’s collaboration on the film is invited, but he declines. “I remember Milos telling me, ‘You have such a strong vision of the story you want to tell. Why don’t you direct it yourself?’” Streisand recalled.

Major studios show no interest, and the project is shelved.

1978

While filming “The Main Event,” Barbra has an epiphany. “We were standing there in the snow, and she said, ‘I hate this movie. I’m going to do Yentl!’” says Jon Peters. “I said, ‘You’re not going to ruin your life and mine. You can’t play a boy! We’re gonna do something else together.’”

1979

Barbra writes a 42-page film treatment, detailing “Yentl” as a voice-over musical. She makes Yentl a 28-ish-year-old spinster (instead of the teenager in Singer’s original story). Barbra immerses herself in Jewish studies. “I really bit the bullet and decided with all the terror that I felt (I was approaching 40) that life is short,” she said, “and one must take risks and chances and risk failure (because there's a lesson in that too) and put some real meaning into my life again, real motivation.” 

Barbra doesn’t put her name on any of the treatments or scripts she writes, in fear that decision-makers would pre-judge the material based on her reputation.

Daily Variety announces that Ted Allan is writing the screenplay. “Barbra called me because [my screenplay] ‘Lies My Father Told Me’ was about me and my grandfather,” Allan said. “It was a loving story of a Jewish family. So, she thought that I had a feel for something Jewish. The script I wrote gave indications of the anti-Semitism in Eastern Europe that drove the Jews to America, and I don’t think that Barbra liked that. She had a different concept.”

The New York Times says the project will be produced by Orion Pictures, Streisand’s Barwood Films, and the Jon Peters Organization. At Orion, Yentl is championed by execs Eric Peskow and Mike Medavoy. Streisand considers Richard Gere for the role of Avigdor.

Rusty Lemorande joins the film. 

FALL 1979

Barbra’s brother Sheldon photographs her standing next to their father Emanuel’s gravestone at Mount Hebron cemetery in Queens, NY. 

“When I came home my brother sent me the picture of my arm around the tombstone. And I think it was [producer] Rusty Lemorande who said, ‘Oh, my God. Look at the picture.’” 

In the photo, the tombstone next to her father's was for a person named “Anchel,” the name Yentl takes when she becomes a man (although Singer spells it “Anshel.”)

“That was the sign,” Streisand said. “I have to direct it.”

Also, that evening, a medium transmits a message from her father to Barbra — “Sing proud.”

NOVEMBER 1979

Orion Pictures green lights “Yentl” film development for one year, with Jon Peters co-producing; Barbra to star in and direct the musical.

1980

Streisand engages her friends, Michel Legrand (music) and Alan and Marilyn Bergman (lyrics) to write the film’s musical score. Marilyn Bergman said: “When it came time to discuss the composer for ‘Yentl,’ Alan and I and Barbra, of course, who was the key person, knowing that we didn’t want a specific ethnic score, realized that the perfect kind of music would be kind of European romantic music.”

And that’s how they decided on Legrand. 

Barbra begins drafting screenplays, consulting rabbis, and blocking scenes with Legrand and the Bergmans. 

“I saw Yentl as a very healthy, normal woman who found herself in an unusual situation, not the haunted dybbuk-type creature that Singer wrote about in his story,” said Streisand.

As a break from the intense work on “Yentl,” Streisand takes a role in “All Night Long,” which filmed April through October 1980. “I worked in ‘All Night Long’ for a few weeks because I was so tired of writing ‘Yentl’ that I had to get off my rear and get away from the table and act,” Streisand said.

FALL 1980

Barbra and Lemorande first visit Czechoslovakia to scout locations. They shoot Super-8 film of Barbra in costume as Anshel. 

“We went many times for that period of 2 or 3 years of pre-production,” Streisand said, “and I always dressed as Yentl … Rusty would film me doing shots here and there with natural light. The Super-8 film was so beautiful that I showed it to my cinematographer to try and capture that look. Because it was a realistic fairy tale, we had to find places that were real but that looked like a fairy tale.”

Streisand stops in Amsterdam to study Rembrandt’s paintings, which would serve to influence “Yentl’s” cinematography and art direction. “The color of the Rembrandt paint is a very, very dark brown. Not black. And the edges of the face are soft and not hard. And I wanted to see with my own eyes these paintings,” Streisand states.

NOVEMBER 19, 1980

After vacillating on whether to shoot “Yentl” on a Los Angeles backlot versus filming abroad in Czechoslovakia, Barwood Films submits a production budget (filming in the Czech Republic) to Orion. Unfortunately, the big-budget film “Heaven’s Gate” bombs the same month and Orion concludes “Yentl” development — scared of another big flop. Jon Peters moves development of “Yentl” to PolyGram Pictures, where he also has a film development deal.

EARLY 1981

Streisand says she and Jon Peters “started arguing and fighting. I said I wanted to talk to [Israeli actor] Assaf Dayan about playing Avigdor. He said, ‘We won’t make the picture with him.’ I said, ‘I can’t even talk to him?’ So, I decided no way can I be in that position, and I took it away from the one person who would make it.”

When PolyGram proposes a budget less than Orion’s, Streisand exits the studio. She records an audition tape of film songs with the Bergmans and Michel Legrand (playing piano) at the Bergmans’ home. Incorporating the tape, Barbra pitches the film to Columbia, Paramount, Warner Brothers, and Twentieth Century-Fox, but they pass. 

“I remember having to go into an executive's office to play my tapes and tell the story,” said Streisand. “It was like being eighteen again and auditioning for a Broadway show.”

After visiting Fox’s president Sherry Lansing, Streisand was discouraged: “I left the office in tears. I couldn’t believe that a woman wouldn’t understand how universal this story was. I always thought of it as a very contemporary story, a love story that would appeal to people around the world.”

MARCH 1981

Serious negotiations commence with United Artists, a deal pitched by powerful agent Stan Kamen. Kamen was Sue Mengers’ rival at the William Morris agency.  Mengers was Streisand’s former agent and friend. “Sue Mengers didn’t want me to do [‘Yentl’],” said Streisand, “Jon Peters said, ‘You’ll never make ‘Yentl.’’ Everybody who didn’t believe in me got canned. I had to leave them. I had to prove them wrong.”

The “suits” at United Artists, Norbert Auerbach and Steven Bach, were won over by Streisand — especially while listening to her tapes of the songs. Rusty Lemorande remembered “she would hum over it if she knew that really got you charged. She knew what she was doing,” he said.

JUNE 22, 1981

United Artists approves “Yentl” with a $14.5 million guaranteed budget. 

“In order to make this movie, I had to give up all my so-called power,” Streisand explained. “[The studio] could take the movie away from me at any time. They finance the movie. They give me fourteen million dollars. They have script approval. But they approved the script that was back when. They can stop me from hiring certain actors. And that's odd for me, because I've always controlled my work, down to the negatives and the printing and the lettering on the covers of my albums.”

Most humbling was giving up the possibility of having final cut of the picture. “I had to eat shit, put it that way,” she said.  “You know what I mean? You want to do it, this is the way you get to do it.”

Pre-production begins, with Stanley O’Toole as executive producer.

Streisand asks her son, Jason, “If I make the picture, will you come with me and go to school in London?” Jason says no; he doesn’t want to leave his school and his friends. “I had to let go,” Streisand realizes.

Several titles are considered, including “A Secret Dream” and “Leah” (a more commercial name than “Yentl.” If used, “Leah” would call herself “Leon” when she posed as a man.)

JUNE - DECEMBER 1981 

British screenwriter Jack Rosenthal (“The Bar Mitzvah Boy”) meets with Barbra to write the screenplay. In his autobiography Rosenthal says Streisand has “nine [screenplays], all written by different writers. Each screenplay is a modification of the one before.” The hairs on his neck rise as “Barbra reads [a screenplay] aloud … When she comes to a song — she sings it.” He turns in a first draft around August 1981.  Streisand decides they will write together.

• Locations scouted in August and September.
• Larry DeWaay replaces O’Toole as executive producer.
• Unable to sign Michael Douglas, Streisand considers John Shea (who played Avigdor on stage), Kevin Kline, and Christopher Walken.
• Mandy Patinkin is cast as Avigdor.
• The Bergmans play tailors in a “pre-rehearsal concept video” on November 6, 1981. Streisand stages “Tomorrow Night” in the Bergman’s living room. The low-tech video greatly resembles the song as it appears in the final film. 
• Streisand videotapes the staging of “No Wonder” on November 20, 1981, using Julie Bergman (daughter of the lyricists) to play Hadass.

EARLY 1982 

• Pre-production completed with principals in London
• Soundtrack recorded at Olympic Recording Studios.

In London during preproduction, and after several drafts of the “Yentl” script, Jack Rosenthal argues with Streisand about fine points whether they can use the modern word “cookies” instead of “biscuits” or “cakes.”  He also dislikes the song “Tomorrow Night” and excludes it in all of his drafts.  Streisand adds the song back in. (“And she was right,” he confesses. “The song and its montage turn out to be one of the best things in the film.”)

Streisand uses a video camera to block “Where Is It Written” (January 20, 1982) and “Look At How He Looks At Me” (March 3, 1982).

APRIL 1, 1982

Rehearsals commence outside London at Lee International Film Studios, Wembley, Middlesex, England.



APRIL 14, 1982

Principal photography commences. Interior shooting begins at Lee International, scheduled to last at least four weeks. Streisand typically lives and works 6 a.m. to 2 a.m. (10-7 actual filming). In July, the crew moves to location in Czechoslovakia.

The Cast