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   In recent days, the actor Mandy Patinkin, who played the master swordsman Inigo Montoya in the classic 1987 film “The Princess Bride,” has received emails from friends alerting him to pictures on the Internet that show scenes taken from the movie with Ted Cruz’s face superimposed on top of his body. 
   
   “They Photoshopped his face right over my face!” Mr. Patinkin said last week when reached by phone at his home in New York’s Hudson Valley. “I said, ‘How can I stop this?’” 
   
   Mr. Cruz, the Texas senator who, according to polls, is now leading the Republican presidential field in Iowa, has long listed “The Princess Bride” as his favorite movie. As a Princeton undergraduate, he watched the movie repeatedly with his friends on the debate team and memorized a good chunk of the lines. 
   
   In the last few weeks, Mr. Cruz, who dabbled, at times disastrously, in acting at Harvard Law School, has started reciting the lines on the campaign trail, including at an Iowa Central Community College event, where he performed a version of Mr. Patinkin’s catchphrase in the movie: “Allo, my name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.” 
   
   As Mr. Patinkin’s inbox became cluttered with videos of Mr. Cruz acting out scenes that he, Carol Kane and Billy Crystal had made famous (“He’s doing all of Billy’s lines!” Mr. Patinkin said), the actor began wondering how much of the movie Mr. Cruz really understood. 
   
   “I would like to be with Senator Cruz for a moment and I would like to respectfully ask him, since he quotes all the lines from ‘The Princess Bride’ and certainly all of my character, Inigo Montoya’s, lines, I would like to know why he doesn’t quote my favorite line?” That line, Mr. Patinkin said, was among the last his character utters in a movie that essentially taught that love conquers all. 
   
   But first, some plot for the uninitiated: While working in the service of Vizzini, a comically arrogant criminal mastermind played by Wallace Shawn, Inigo is bested by the movie’s hero, the mysterious Man in Black. 
   
   Soon after, Inigo and his fellow hired hand, played by Andre the Giant, join the Man in Black in his noble mission to rescue his true love, played by the “House of Cards” star Robin Wright, who has been forcibly engaged to the evil prince Humperdinck, who plans to strangle her on their wedding night. But Inigo’s true motive is to avenge the death of his father, slain decades earlier, by Humperdinck’s sadistic six-fingered lieutenant. He does so in the climactic rescue scene at the end of the movie, in which he magically overcomes mortal wounds to win a duel to the death. 
   
   “After the princess flies out the window and falls into Andre the Giant’s arms,” Mr. Patinkin said, “Inigo says to the Man in Black, ‘I have been in the revenge business so long, now that it’s over, I don’t know what to do with the rest of my life.’” 
   
   Mr. Cruz, in Mr. Patinkin’s heavily left-leaning worldview, is trafficking in the revenge business, appealing to anxious voters by saying of the Islamic State, “We will carpet-bomb them into oblivion,” and by exploiting fears about immigrants and Muslims. 
   
   “Senator Cruz, if you’re going to say those lines, you’ve got to say the other line, too,” Mr. Patinkin said. 
   
   Sounding increasingly vexed, he added: “This man is not putting forth ideas that are at the heart of what that movie is all about. I would love for Senator Cruz, and everyone creating fear mongering and hatred, to consider creating hope, optimism and love. Open your arms to these people, these refugees trying to get into our country, and open your hearts.” 
   
   Catherine Frazier, a spokeswoman for the Cruz campaign, said in an email that the senator was “a huge fan of the film and the actors in it.” 
   
   “Having some fun with a cult classic like ‘The Princess Bride’ should be something we can all get behind, politics aside,” she said. ||||| View photo . Ted Cruz is a man of diverse tastes (Yahoo News/original image AP) 
   
   Love him or hate him, it’s safe to say Ted Cruz is currently the most compelling figure in U.S. politics today. 
   
   
   
   The first-term Texas senator led the Republican charge against Obamacare that resulted in a 16-day government shutdown and ignited the passions of millions. And if political insiders are to be believed, Cruz is already gearing up to run for president in 2016. 
   
   But for someone who has wielded so much influence in such little time, most people know very little about Cruz as a person. 
   
   A few publications are aiming to change that. On Thursday, Cruz sat down with the Des Moines Register for a Q&A; and revealed a few facts about himself: 
   
   His dream job: “I’d love to be the starting point guard for the Houston Rockets, and I’m confident that there is no universe in which that will ever come to pass.” 
   
   Favorite movie: A self-described “huge movie buff,” Cruz says his favorite movie is 1987’s “The Princess Bride.” And that revelation led to a series of very obvious Internet references to the film. Fondness for this film is a true barometer of humanity and should provide a ray of sunshine into the hearts of even Cruz’s most steadfast opponents. 
   
   Least favorite food: As much as Cruz loves movies, he hates avocados. “I despise avocado. It’s the only food I dislike, and I dislike it passionately,” he said. “Which is ironic, because I’m Cuban and my dad grew up with avocado trees in his backyard. My whole family eats avocados like crazy, but I can’t stand them.” 
   
   Of course, Cruz should be careful to not re-create George H.W. Bush’s broccoli moment, as Texas is quickly becoming one of the larger avocado-growing states in the U.S. His comments already invoked the playful wrath of the Dallas Observer’s Liz Goulding, who wrote, “How can you understand Texas if you don't enjoy chips and guacamole on a sunny patio every once and awhile (sic), or if you've never discovered that perfect mix of avocado, lime juice, and salt at home?” 
   
   When he was a Houston lawyer first running for the Senate in 2012, Cruz gave an interview to the Dallas Morning News in which he revealed some other personal facts. 
   
   Worst school subject: French. 
   
   Favorite food: While he despises avocados, Cruz says he loves beef enchiladas and Guinness stout. 
   
   Skills: As to any “hidden talent,” Cruz said, “I love games of any sort: cards, chess, backgammon.” He especially likes playing them on his iPhone, despite not having an unlimited data plan. 
   
   Family background: While many have pointed out that the Texas senator was actually born in Canada, very few know that he is of Cuban descent. "I do enjoy an occasional cigar. (I am Cuban after all),” he told the paper. 
   
   Education: Cruz graduated cum laude from Princeton, magna cum laude from Harvard Law School and clerked for former Chief Justice William Rehnquist. But, really, at the end of the day Cruz just wants to see Princess Buttercup returned safely home and maybe sneak in a game or two on his iPhone before bed. 
   
   
   
   So, there’s your basic primer on the man Slate’s John Dickerson calls a “populist egghead.” ||||| Rather than explain why he loves the movie The Princess Bride, Ted Cruz decided to just demonstrate. The Texas senator and Republican presidential candidate went ahead and acted out an entire scene from the 1987 comedy classic — complete with imitations of the characters' voices — while taping a "Candidate Cafe" segment for WMUR. 
   
   While most of the people at the table are cracking up laughing, some, like the guy sitting to Cruz's left, don't seem to know what to think of the whole thing. "My media team is now having a heart attack," Cruz quips after wrapping up his rendition.
target: – To Mandy Patinkin, it's inconceivable that Ted Cruz has been uttering lines from The Princess Bride along the campaign trail—and the actor, who played Inigo Montoya in the 1987 cult film, has had enough. "How can I stop this?" was Patinkin's reaction when friends started emailing him about images online that featured Cruz's face Photoshopped onto his character's body, he tells the New York Times. Cruz has long said the movie is his favorite, and he's committed a good portion of it to memory (including Patinkin's famous line: "Allo, my name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die"). But Patinkin isn't sure Cruz understands the film's subtext: namely that, despite the film focusing partly on his character's mission for vengeance, the real meaning revolves around the movie's hero rescuing his true love. "[Cruz] is not putting forth ideas that are at the heart of what that movie is all about," Patinkin tells the Times in a tone the paper describes as "increasingly vexed." Patinkin cites one of his character's final lines in the movie as one that should stand out more to Cruz: "I have been in the revenge business so long, now that it's over, I don't know what to do with the rest of my life." The 63-year-old actor's beef with Cruz is that he's too focused on that revenge, preying on voter anxiety by, as the Times puts it, "exploiting fears about immigrants and Muslims." Says Patinkin, "Open your arms to these people, these refugees trying to get into our country, and open your hearts." A spokeswoman for Cruz's campaign told the Times in an email that "having some fun with a cult classic … should be something we can all get behind, politics aside." In other words, no "as you wish" from Cruz. (Will Cruz pull out a Princess Bride quote during Tuesday night's debate?)