Joe Mantegna’s role in “As We See It” as the father of a young man with autism is deeply personal.
“I have a 34-year-old daughter [named Mia] with autism,” the actor, 74, told Page Six in a recent interview. “I’ve been asked in the past, ‘What’s it like to have a daughter with autism?’ And my answer always is, ‘I don’t know what it’s like not to have a daughter with autism.’
“Of course, I have my wife [Arlene Vrhel] and I have my other daughter [Gia, 31]. So the four of us make this family, and that’s our dynamic.”
“As We See It” follows three roommates on the autism spectrum as they navigate the world in their early 20s, try to get and keep jobs, make friends and fall in love. The trio have a person who oversees their lives and helps them deal with everyday issues.
Mantegna and Vrhel, who married in 1975, had a very different experience when Mia was diagnosed at age 2.
“There wasn’t a lot of information, wasn’t a lot of support groups,” he noted before adding, “But a lot has changed in the last 30-plus years. At the end of the day, autism is not going to go anywhere. It’s part of the tapestry of the world. And that’s just one aspect of it in this show.”
The “Criminal Minds” star is fascinated by Mia’s brain, explaining that she has difficulty being able to tie her shoes but can rattle off what the family did on a certain date decades ago.
“It’s always kind of almost a mystery. Like, ‘Wow, I’d like to be able to spend a day in your head just to see what’s going on,'” he marveled.
Mantegna has had a career spanning decades on television, film and stage, including a Tony Award for “Glengarry Glen Ross.” To many, he is best known as the voice of mob boss Fat Tony on “The Simpsons.”
“I’ve been doing Tony for 30-plus years now, so I guess it’s resonating with some, certainly among the ‘Simpsons’ fans out there, so I feel great,” he said.
Mantegna is leery of insisting that actors only voice characters who share their ethnic background. “Simpsons” stalwart Hank Azaria stepped down from voicing Kwik-E-Mart owner Apu Nahasapeemapetilon in January 2020 and admitted last year that he needs “to go to every single Indian person in this country and personally apologize.”
Mantegna told us, “I’m not necessarily a proponent of that, [that] a person has to be this in order to play this. However, I think one thing, perhaps one advantage of the fact that I’m an Italian American playing that role is because I’ve done this.”
And the “Godfather III” actor also doesn’t agree with Italian American groups that might complain about stereotypes.
“My feeling is this, ‘Look, we’ve got to get past all that,'” he explained. “There were Italian American guys that were gangsters, you know? And so the distant end of ‘The Simpsons’ are making fun of it and American as a parody. And it’s fine. It’s OK.
“Hopefully, people are intelligent enough to know that … for every gangster, there was a million guys like, you know, Enrico Fermi and Galileo and da Vinci and Michelangelo.”
“As We See It” debuts on Friday on Amazon Prime Video.
