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Biography

Only in the 1960s, with Hollywood conventions being stood on their heads along with societal mores, could this physically unprepossessing actor have made it as a leading man; in a previous era Hoffman would probably have plied his trade as a character actor rather than a powerful megastar. Although he shot his first movie, Madigan's Million in 1966 (released in 1968), Hoffman first impressed 1960s audiences in The Graduate (1967, earning his first Academy Award nomination), playing a disaffected, uncertain young man who drifts into a sexual affair with a woman in his parents' circle, only to fall in love with her daughter. The film's droll humor, relatively frank sexuality, satirical view of the upper middle class, and observation of a 'troubled' younger generation made it a surprise smash.

The bashful, nasally Hoffman soon proved himself capable of submerging himself in any role. His performance as street hustler Ratso Rizzo in 1969's Midnight Cowboy (another Oscar-nominated turn) was uncannily convincing. As an Old West rogue in 1970's Little Big Man Hoffman's scenes as a 121-year-old man show him radiating that age through layers of latex makeup. During the 1970s he consistently knocked out critics and audiences in a variety of roles, playing a doomed Devil's Island prisoner in Papillon (1973), hounded comedian Lenny Bruce in Lenny (1974, again Oscar-nominated), and Watergate journalist Carl Bernstein in All the President's Men (1976). Often described as taking 'Method' techniques to the point of absurdity, he once kept himself awake for days to look more tired for a scene in 1976's Marathon Man.

Constantly looking for challenges, Hoffman played an ex-con in Straight Time (1978) and earned some of the best reviews of his career (and some of his worst for 1979's Agatha). He then took a much warmer role, becoming a modern everyman in Kramer vs. Kramer (1979) as a careerist man whose wife walks out on him, leaving him to raise their son - and reorder the priorities in his life. The performance earned him an Academy Award. Several years later he took another sharp turn, tackling a role that some people thought unplayable: a failed actor who disguises as a woman and achieves great success on TV. The film was Tootsie (1982), an enormous hit which earned Hoffman an Oscar nomination and convinced whatever naysayers were left that there was nothing he couldn't do.

Mixing stage and screen work in the 1980s, he created a new interpretation of the Willy Loman character in a 1984 revival of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman. (He recreated the performance on television a year later and won an Emmy Award in the process.) In 1987 he teamed with pal Warren Beatty for the megabomb Ishtar. The two were very funny as hapless songwriter/performers, but the film wasn't; both stars attributed its failure to lack of youth appeal, rather than the fact that it was a lousy movie. To ameliorate this perceived problem, Hoffman teamed with handsome young superstar Tom Cruise for his next film, Rain Man (1988), limning the character of an autistic savant with skill and integrity and earning another Best Actor Oscar in the process. In 1989 he was cast, rather improbably, as Sean Connery's son (and Matthew Broderick's father) in Family Business. Then in Beatty's own stab at the youth market, Dick Tracy (1990), Hoffman contributed a brief but funny cameo as the petty crook Mumbles. The year 1991 saw him cast as two legendary bad guys: gangster Dutch Schultz in Billy Bathgate and Captain Hook in Hook (a performance he based, in part, on William F. Buckley, with some Terry-Thomas thrown in). In 1992 he put a new slant on Ratso Rizzo as the title character in Hero, then played a heroic army medical researcher in Outbreak (1995).

But what past led the actor, Los Angeles-born and standing at 5'6", to stardom?

Dustin Lee Hoffman was born August 8, 1937 in the city of Angels. He graduated from Los Angeles High School in 1955 and went to Santa Monica City College, though dropped out after a year due to poor grades. Before he did, however, he took an acting course after being told that "nobody flunks acting." Hoffman decided to go into acting because he wasn't keen on the idea of work or going into the service. After training at The Pasadena Playhouse for two years, he eventually landed his first role in the television show Naked City, and the rest is, literally, history.

Credit: IMDb.Com

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Filmography

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Quotes

• "We all believe what we read. I read how Tom Cruise and I were two big egos holding up shooting. I know that isn't true - but if I wasn't making a movie with him and I just picked up the paper, I'd believe it. That's interesting, isn't it?"

• "Psychologically, Gene and myself, we did not think about making it in the terms that people think about. We fully expected to be failures for our entire life. Meaning that we would always be scrambling to get a part. We were actors. We had no pretensions. There was more dignity in being unsuccessful." On himself and Gene Hackman being stage actors in New York City prior to their success

• "I got into acting so that I could meet girls. Pretty girls came later. First, I wanted to start off with someone with two legs, who'd smile at me and look soft."

• "I lived below the official American poverty line until I was 31."

• "If a lot of dogs are on the beach, the first thing they do is smell each other's ass. The information that's gotten somehow makes pacifists out of all of them. I've thought, 'If only we smelled each other's asses, there wouldn't be any war.'"

• "You go to the cinema and you realise you're watching the third act. There is no first or second act. There is this massive film-making where you spend this incredible amount of money and play right to the demographic. You can tell how much money the film is going to make by how it does on the first weekend. The whole culture is in the craphouse. It's not just true in the movies, it's also true in the theatre."

• "Stardom equals freedom. It's the only equation that matters."

• "I grew up thinking a movie star had to be like Rock Hudson or Tab Hunter, certainly nobody in any way like me."

• "One thing about being successful is that I stopped being afraid of dying. Once you're a star you're dead already. You're embalmed."

• "God knows I've done enough crap in my life to grow a few flowers."

Credit: IMDb.Com

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Trivia

• Was considered for the role of Michael Corleone in The Godfather (1972).

• Awarded $3 Million in damages and compensation in a case against a Los Angeles magazine that printed a computer generated image of Hoffman in a dress.

• During the filming of Wag the Dog (1997) Hoffman, his co-star Robert De Niro and director Barry Levinson had an impromptu meeting with President Clinton at a Washington hotel. "So what's this movie about?" the president asked De Niro. De Niro looked over to Levinson hoping he would answer the question. Levinson, in turn, looked over to Hoffman. Hoffman, realizing there was no one else to pass the buck to, is quoted as saying "so I just started to tap dance. I can't even remember what I said."

• Ranked #41 in Empire (UK) magazine's 'The Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time' list. [October 1997]

• Father of Jake Hoffman, Rebecca Hoffman, Maxwell Hoffman, and Jenna Byrne.

• Parents named him Dustin after actor Dustin Farnum.

• Slept over at Gene Hackman and his wife's apartment in Manhattan when he was a struggling actor.

• In July 2001, a federal appeals court overturned the verdict that awarded Hoffman $3 million in damages for being depicted in a digitally-altered photograph in Los Angeles Magazine. The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals found that because the photo appeared in an article, not an advertisement, the use of the actor's likeness did not constitute "commercial speech" and was entitled to the full protection of the 1st Amendment.

• Brother-in-law of producer Lee Gottsegen.

• Was in early consideration for the role of Rick Deckard in Blade Runner (1982). The role eventually went to Harrison Ford.

• Has known Gene Hackman since 1956.

• Has a house in the Kensington area of London.

• On March 6, 1970, he and his wife Anne were living in a brownstone on 11th St. in NYC's Greenwich Village when the house next door blew up. Luckily, he and his family weren't home. Members of the radical 60s domestic terror group, Weathermen, were living in that house unbeknownst to anyone and had stored a large cache of explosives that accidentally detonated, killing three of the group's members. Henry Fonda's ex wife, Susan Wager, was also a neighbor in that block who witnessed the explosion.

• Was a neighbor of Mel Brooks in New York and was set to play the role of Franz Liebkind, the half-crazy former Nazi who authored "the worst play ever written", 'Springtime for Hitler', in Brooks's first film, The Producers (1968). Just before production was to commence, Hoffman was offered the role of Ben Braddock in The Graduate (1967), co-starring Brooks' wife Anne Bancroft, and asked to be let out of his contract. The role of Liebkind eventually went to Kenneth Mars.

• Met actor Gene Hackman in the first month at Pasadena Playhouse. Had several classes with him. Hackman failed out after three months and moved to New York to continue being a stage actor.

• After The Pasadena Playhouse, Hoffman decided to move to New York and looked up Gene Hackman. The two of them roomed together in New York at Hackman's one bedroom apartment on 2nd ½ and 26th Street. Hoffman slept on the kitchen floor. Originally, Hackman had offered to let him stay a few nights, but Hoffman would not leave. Hackman had to take him out to look for his own apartment.

• Another thespian he roomed with in New York was Robert Duvall.

• As roommates, Hoffman and Gene Hackman would often go to the apartment rooftop and play the drums. Hoffman played the bongo drums while Hackman played the conga drums. They did it out of their love for Marlon Brando, who they had heard played music in clubs. They wanted to be like Brando and were big fans of his.

• Entered into The Guinness Book of World Records as 'Greatest Age Span Portrayed By A Movie Actor' for Little Big Man (1970), in which he portrayed a character from age 17 to age 121.

• Despite being old friends and roommates with both Gene Hackman and Robert Duvall back in the '60's, it was literally decades before he appeared on screen with either. He finally starred with Hackman in Runaway Jury (2003), and with Duvall in The Lost City (2005).

• Was voted the 28th Greatest Movie Star of all time by Entertainment Weekly.

• Was interested in playing Shylock in Michael Radford's adaptation of William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice (2004). However, by the time he contacted director Radford, actor Al Pacino had already been cast for the role.

• While filming Finding Neverland (2004), he lost the tip of a finger and performed one day of shooting on morphine.

• In 1984, he played the part of Willie Loman in a revivial of Death of A Salesman on Broadway. The production won a Tony for Best Reproduction. However, his performance was looked down upon by critics and was snubbed by the Tony Committee, even though he won a Drama Desk award. In 1985, he reprised this role for TV and showed the theatre world by winning an Emmy and a Golden Globe Award for his performance.

• In 1990, he played Shylock in a revival of Shakespeare's The Merchant Of Venice on Broadway for which he received a Tony nomination as Best Actor (Play).

• Has appeared in two films about Peter Pan (Hook [1991] and Finding Neverland [2004]). Following his appearance in Hook (1991), his close friend and former roommate Gene Hackman began calling him 'Hook' in a jocular manner. The name stuck and his contemporaries call him by his nickname to this day.

• Both he and Robert Duvall said one of the best reasons why they went to acting classes were the girls. When they were young, the classes were a goldmine to them.

• Recipient of a Lincoln Center tribute in April 2005.

• Had expressed an early desire to play the title role in Gandhi (1982), but was offered Tootsie (1982) the same year and ended up taking the latter role. He eventually lost the Oscar that year to Ben Kingsley, who played Gandhi.

• In 1993, he (together with Anne Bancroft) accepted the Oscar for 'Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium' on behalf of Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, who wasn't present at the awards ceremony.

• Was so boyish looking at age 30 that he played a generation younger than Anne Bancroft in The Graduate, even though she is only six years older than he.

• Is from a family of Polish Jews.

Credit: IMDb.Com

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