Philip Seymour Hoffman
| Philip Seymour Hoffman | |
|---|---|
 Hoffman in October 2011 |
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| Born | July 23, 1967 Fairport, New York, U.S. |
| Occupation | Actor, director |
| Years active | 1991–present |
| Partner | Mimi O'Donnell (1999–present) |
Philip Seymour Hoffman (born July 23, 1967) is an American actor and director. Hoffman began acting in television in 1991, and the following year started to appear in films. He gradually gained recognition for his supporting work in a series of notable films, including Scent of a Woman (1992), Twister (1996), Boogie Nights (1997), Happiness (1998), The Big Lebowski (1998), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Almost Famous (2000), 25th Hour (2002), Punch-Drunk Love (2002), Cold Mountain (2003), Along Came Polly (2004) and Mission: Impossible III (2006).
In 2005, Hoffman played the title role in the biographical film Capote (2005), for which he won multiple acting awards including an Academy Award for Best Actor. He received another two Academy Award nominations for his supporting work in Charlie Wilson's War (2007) and Doubt (2008). Other critically acclaimed films in recent years have included Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007) and The Savages (2007). In 2010, Hoffman made his feature film directorial debut with Jack Goes Boating.
Hoffman is also an accomplished theater actor and director. He joined the LAByrinth Theater Company in 1995, and has directed and performed in numerous Off-Broadway productions. His performances in two Broadway plays led to two Tony Award nominations: one for Best Leading Actor in True West (2000), and another for Best Featured Actor in Long Day's Journey into Night (2003). Hoffman is set to star as Willy Loman in a revival of Arthur Miller's play Death of a Salesman beginning on February 13, 2012 at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre.
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[edit] Early life
Hoffman was born in Fairport, New York, the son of Marilyn L. O'Connor, a family court judge, lawyer, and civil rights activist, and Gordon Stowell Hoffman, a former Xerox executive.[1] He has two sisters, Jill and Emily, and a brother, Gordy Hoffman, who scripted the 2002 film Love Liza, in which Philip starred. His father was a Protestant of part German ancestry and his mother was of Irish Catholic background; Hoffman was not raised with a deep commitment to either religion.[2][3][4] Hoffman's parents divorced when he was nine years old.[5]
Hoffman attended the 1984 Theater School at the New York State Summer School of the Arts. After graduating from Fairport High School, Hoffman attended the Circle in the Square Theatre's summer program, continuing his acting training with the acting teacher Alan Langdon.[6] He received a BFA in drama in 1989 from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts. At NYU, he was a founding member of the notoriously short-lived and volatile[clarification needed] theater company the Bullstoi Ensemble with actor Steven Schub and director Bennett Miller.[7] Soon after graduating, he went to rehab for drug and alcohol addiction and has since remained sober.[8]
Hoffman has had success directing in the theater as well, putting on shows for LAByrinth Theater Company. Of the difference between acting and directing in a play, Hoffman has said that "the director’s experience is not the real experience...You are the most subjective person in the room. You have no objectivity. You have to take a couple of weeks off and then come back to watch it without telling anyone, and you will see it with different eyes."[9]
[edit] Film and television work
Hoffman's first role was as a defendant in a 1991 episode of the television series Law & Order. He made his film breakthrough in 1992 when he appeared in four feature films, with the most successful film being Scent of a Woman, in which he played a rather unscrupulous classmate of Chris O'Donnell's character. He had been stocking shelves at a city grocery store at the time before landing the role and credits the film with kickstarting his career.
Hoffman has established a successful and respected film career playing diverse and idiosyncratic characters in supporting roles, working with a wide variety of noted directors, including Todd Solondz, The Coen Brothers, Spike Lee, Cameron Crowe, David Mamet, Robert Benton, Anthony Minghella and Paul Thomas Anderson; notably, he has appeared in four out of five of Anderson's feature films to date (Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, Magnolia, and Punch-Drunk Love).
He appeared in The Party's Over, a documentary about the 2000 US elections. Throughout his career he has rarely been given a chance to play the lead role. In 2002, however, Hoffman starred as a widower coping with his wife's suicide in Love Liza, for which his brother, Gordy Hoffman, wrote the screenplay. In 2003, he played the lead role in Owning Mahowny as a bank employee who embezzles money to feed his gambling addiction.
Hoffman has continued to play supporting roles in such films as Cold Mountain, as a carnally obsessed preacher, Along Came Polly, as Ben Stiller's crude, has-been actor buddy, and Mission: Impossible III, as villainous arms dealer Owen Davian out to kill Ethan Hunt.
He received his first Emmy Award nomination for the HBO miniseries Empire Falls, but lost to castmate and personal idol Paul Newman. One of Hoffman's earliest roles was as a police deputy who gets punched in the face by Newman in 1994's Nobody's Fool. He received a second Emmy Award nomination for the Daytime Emmy Awards for his vocal work on the TV Series Arthur.
In 2005, Hoffman won widespread acclaim for his portrayal of writer Truman Capote in the film Capote. His performance received numerous high-profile accolades and awards, including the Academy Award for Best Actor, the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor - Motion Picture Drama, the Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture, and the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role. In addition, he was also awarded Best Actor by at least ten film critic associations, including the National Board of Review, Toronto Film Critics, and Los Angeles Film Critics.
In 2007, Hoffman was nominated for the Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for playing Gust Avrakotos, a CIA officer who helps Congressman Charlie Wilson support a covert war in Afghanistan in the movie Charlie Wilson's War. In 2008, he was also nominated for Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for the same role, which he lost to Javier Bardem for No Country for Old Men.
In 2008, he appeared in Synecdoche, New York, in which he played Caden Cotard, a man who attempts to build a scale replica of New York inside a warehouse for a play, and Doubt, in which he played Father Brendan Flynn, a priest accused of sexually abusing a student. He received Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild nominations for the latter. He also received a second consecutive nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Doubt.
[edit] Personal life
Hoffman is in a relationship with costume designer Mimi O'Donnell. They met while working on the 1999 play In Arabia We'd All Be Kings, which Hoffman directed. They have a son, Cooper Alexander, born in March 2003, and two daughters, Tallulah, born in November 2006,[10] and Willa, born in October 2008.[11]
[edit] Filmography
[edit] References
- ^ "Philip Seymour Hoffman Biography (1967-)". Filmreference.com. http://www.filmreference.com/film/65/Philip-Seymour-Hoffman.html. Retrieved August 14, 2010.
- ^ Whitty, Stephen (December 8, 2008). "The talented Mr. Hoffman". Nj.com. http://www.nj.com/entertainment/tv/index.ssf/2008/12/the_talented_mr_hoffman.html. Retrieved January 4, 2009.
- ^ "PSH Frequently Asked Questions". http://ddraven.tripod.com/psh/faq.html. Retrieved November 1, 2006.
- ^ "Transcript: Inside the Actor's Studio, 2000". http://ddraven.tripod.com/psh/transcriptitas.html. Retrieved November 1, 2006.
- ^ "Philip Seymour Hoffman Biography". Yahoo! Movies. http://movies.yahoo.com/shop?d=hc&id=1800021779&cf=biog&intl=us. Retrieved November 1, 2006.
- ^ "Philip Seymour Hoffman.net A PSH Fansite". Philipseymourhoffman.net. July 23, 1967. http://philipseymourhoffman.net/biography.htm. Retrieved August 14, 2010.
- ^ Philip Seymour Hoffman on Inside the Actors Studio
- ^ "Nominee Hoffman once struggled with drugs". Associated Press. February 16, 2006. http://msnbc.msn.com/id/11390662/. Retrieved November 1, 2006.
- ^ Stein, June. "Philip Seymour Hoffman", BOMB Magazine, Spring, 2008. Retrieved August 1, 2011.
- ^ Hancock, Noelle (June 22, 2006). "Philip Seymour Hoffman and Girlfriend Expecting Second Child". Us Weekly. http://www.usmagazine.com/node/1288. Retrieved November 1, 2006.
- ^ Hirschberg, Lynn (December 19, 2008). "A Higher Calling". New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/21/magazine/21hoffman-t.html?_r=1&hp. Retrieved January 4, 2009.
[edit] External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Philip Seymour Hoffman |
- Philip Seymour Hoffman at the Internet Movie Database
- Philip Seymour Hoffman at the Internet Broadway Database
- Philip Seymour Hoffman at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
- Philip Seymour Hoffman Biography
- NPR Interview (09/2005)
- Philip Seymour Hoffman talks about his role in Capote on the Tavis Smiley show
- Brandt Tribute Lebowski Podcast's tribute to Hoffman's character in The Big Lebowski.
- 1967 births
- Actors from New York
- American film actors
- American film directors
- American people of German descent
- American people of Irish descent
- American stage actors
- American television actors
- American theatre directors
- Best Actor BAFTA Award winners
- Best Actor Academy Award winners
- Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
- Circle in the Square Theatre School alumni
- Independent Spirit Award for Best Male Lead winners
- Living people
- New York University alumni
- People from Rochester, New York
- People self-identifying as alcoholics
- People self-identifying as substance abusers
