1983 · Behind the Songs
A prayer from behind the camera.
Yentl was the film Barbra Streisand had pursued for more than a decade: the story of a young woman in an Eastern European shtetl who disguises herself as a boy so she can study the Talmud, drawn from Isaac Bashevis Singer’s “Yentl the Yeshiva Boy.” Streisand directed, co-wrote, produced, and starred in the 1983 picture — and for its music she turned to Michel Legrand, with lyrics by Alan and Marilyn Bergman. “Papa, Can You Hear Me?” is the film’s emotional center, a daughter’s prayer sung to a father who is no longer there.
The song was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song, and Legrand’s score went on to win the Oscar for Best Original Score. What sets the Yentl songs apart is how they are sung: not as showstoppers but as interior thoughts, the characters thinking out loud in melody. “Papa, Can You Hear Me?” is the purest example — a lullaby in reverse, a child comforting herself with the memory of a parent’s voice.