Philip Seymour Hoffman
Philip Seymour Hoffman (July 23, 1967 – February 2, 2014) was an American actor. Known for his distinctive supporting and character roles—eccentrics, underdogs, and misfits—he acted in many films and theatrical productions, including leading roles, from the early 1990s until his death in 2014. He was voted one of the 50 greatest actors of all time in a 2022 readers' poll by Empire magazine.
Philip Seymour Hoffman
February 2, 2014
- Actor
- producer
- theatre director
1991–2014
Mimi O'Donnell (1999–2014)
3, including Cooper
Gordy Hoffman (brother)
Hoffman studied acting at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts. He gained recognition for his supporting work, notably in Scent of a Woman (1992), Boogie Nights (1997), Happiness (1998), The Big Lebowski (1998), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), and Almost Famous (2000). He began to occasionally play leading roles, and for his portrayal of the author Truman Capote in Capote (2005), won the Academy Award for Best Actor. Further Oscar nominations came for playing a brutally frank CIA officer in Charlie Wilson's War (2007), a priest accused of child sexual abuse in Doubt (2008), and the charismatic leader of a Scientology-type movement in The Master (2012).
While he mainly worked in independent films, including The Savages (2007) and Synecdoche, New York (2008), Hoffman also appeared in Hollywood blockbusters, such as Twister (1996) and Mission: Impossible III (2006). He played Plutarch Heavensbee in the Hunger Games series (2013–2015), in one of his final roles. The feature Jack Goes Boating (2010) marked his debut as a filmmaker. Hoffman was also an accomplished theater actor and director. He joined the off-Broadway LAByrinth Theater Company in 1995, where he directed, produced, and appeared in numerous stage productions. Hoffman received Tony Award nominations for his performances in the Broadway revivals of Sam Shepard's True West (2000), Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night (2003), and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman (2012).
Hoffman struggled with drug addiction as a young adult and relapsed in 2012 after many years of sobriety. In February 2014, he died of combined drug intoxication. Remembered for bringing nuance, depth, and humanity to the versatile roles he inhabited, Hoffman was described in his New York Times obituary as "perhaps the most ambitious and widely admired American actor of his generation".[1]
Career[edit]
1991–1995: Early career[edit]
After graduating, Hoffman worked in off-Broadway theater and made additional money with customer service jobs.[9][10] He made his screen debut in 1991, in a Law & Order episode called "The Violence of Summer", playing a man accused of rape.[12] He made his film debut the following year, when he was credited as "Phil Hoffman" in the independent film Triple Bogey on a Par Five Hole. After this, he adopted his grandfather's name, Seymour, to avoid confusion with another actor.[13] More film roles promptly followed, with appearances in the studio production My New Gun, and a small role in the comedy Leap of Faith, starring Steve Martin.[14][15] Following these roles, he gained attention playing a spoiled private school student in the Oscar-winning Al Pacino film Scent of a Woman (1992). Hoffman auditioned five times for his role, which The Guardian journalist Ryan Gilbey says gave him an early opportunity "to indulge his skill for making unctuousness compelling".[16] The film earned US$134 million worldwide[17] and was the first to get Hoffman noticed.[18] Reflecting on Scent of a Woman, Hoffman later said, "If I hadn't gotten into that film, I wouldn't be where I am today."[12] At this time, he quit his job in a delicatessen to become a professional actor.[13][19]
Hoffman continued playing small roles throughout the early 1990s. After appearing in Joey Breaker and the critically panned teen zombie picture My Boyfriend's Back,[20] he had a more notable role playing John Cusack's wealthy friend in the crime comedy Money for Nothing.[21] In 1994, he portrayed an inexperienced mobster in the crime thriller The Getaway, starring Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger,[22] and he subsequently appeared with Andy García and Meg Ryan in the romantic drama When a Man Loves a Woman. He then played an uptight police deputy who gets punched by Paul Newman—one of Hoffman's acting idols—in the drama Nobody's Fool.[12][23]
Still considering stage work to be fundamental to his career,[18][24] Hoffman joined the LAByrinth Theater Company of New York City in 1995.[21] This association lasted the remainder of his life; along with appearing in multiple productions, he later became co-artistic director of the theater company with John Ortiz, and directed various plays over the years.[24] Hoffman's only film appearance of 1995 was in the 22-minute short comedy The Fifteen Minute Hamlet, which satirized the film industry in an Elizabethan setting. He played the characters of Bernardo, Horatio, and Laertes alongside Austin Pendleton's Hamlet.[25]
1996–1999: Rising star[edit]
Between April and May 1996, Hoffman appeared at the Joseph Papp Public Theater in a Mark Wing-Davey production of Caryl Churchill's The Skriker.[26] Following this, based on his work in Scent of a Woman, he was cast by writer–director Paul Thomas Anderson to appear in his debut feature Hard Eight (1996).[16] Hoffman had only a brief role in the crime thriller, playing a cocksure young craps player, but it began the most important collaboration of his career.[16][a] Before cementing his creative partnership with Anderson, Hoffman appeared in one of the year's biggest blockbusters,[27] Twister, playing a grubby, hyperactive storm chaser alongside Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton. According to a People survey of Twitter and Facebook users, Twister is the film with which Hoffman is most popularly associated.[28] He then reunited with Anderson for the director's second feature, Boogie Nights, about the Golden Age of Pornography. The ensemble piece starred Mark Wahlberg, Julianne Moore, and Burt Reynolds; Hoffman played a boom operator, described by David Fear of Rolling Stone as a "complete, unabashed loser",[21] who attempts to seduce Wahlberg's character. Warmly received by critics, the film grew into a cult classic,[12][29] and has been cited as the role in which Hoffman first showed his full ability. Fear commended the "naked emotional neediness" of the performance, adding that it made for compulsive viewing.[21][30] Hoffman later expressed his appreciation for Anderson when he called the director "incomparable".[31]
Death[edit]
On February 2, 2014, Hoffman was found dead in the bathroom of his Manhattan apartment by his friend, the playwright and screenwriter David Bar Katz.[148] He was 46 years old.[149] Although friends stated that Hoffman's drug use was under control at the time,[144] detectives searching the apartment found heroin and prescription medication at the scene and revealed that he had a syringe in his arm.[150] Hoffman's death was officially ruled an accident caused by "acute mixed drug intoxication, including heroin, cocaine, benzodiazepines, and amphetamine".[151] Michael Schwirtz of The New York Times said, "whether Hoffman had taken all of the substances on the same day, or whether any of the substances had remained in his system from earlier use, was not reported."[152]
A funeral Mass was held at St. Ignatius Loyola Church in Manhattan on February 7, 2014, and was attended by many of his close friends and former co-stars including Amy Adams, Cate Blanchett, Ellen Burstyn, Louis C.K., Ethan Hawke, Laura Linney, Julianne Moore, Paul Thomas Anderson, Mike Nichols, Joaquin Phoenix, John C. Reilly, Jake Gyllenhaal, Diane Sawyer, Ben Stiller, Meryl Streep, Diane Keaton, Marisa Tomei, Brian Dennehy, Sam Rockwell, Josh Hamilton, Justin Theroux, Chris Rock and Michelle Williams. After the Mass, Hoffman's body was taken to be cremated, with his ashes given to his partner and children.[153][154] He left his fortune of around $35 million to Mimi O'Donnell in his October 2004 will, trusting her to distribute money to their children.[155]
Hoffman's death was lamented by fans and the film industry and was described by several commentators as a considerable loss to the profession.[69][105][126][156][157] On February 5, 2014, the LAByrinth Theatre Company honored his memory by holding a candlelight vigil, and Broadway dimmed its lights for one minute.[158] Three weeks after Hoffman's death, Katz established the American Playwriting Foundation in Hoffman's memory. With the money received from a libel lawsuit against the National Enquirer which inaccurately claimed that Hoffman and Katz were lovers, the foundation awards an annual prize of $45,000 to the author of an unproduced play. Katz named this the "Relentless Prize" in honor of Hoffman's dedication to the profession.[159][160] He would later remember Hoffman with a poem published in The Guardian in December 2014.[161] In tribute, actress Cate Blanchett dedicated her BAFTA trophy to Hoffman when she received the award for Blue Jasmine on February 16.[162] Years later, at the 90th Academy Awards, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri actor Sam Rockwell dedicated his win for Best Supporting Actor to Hoffman.[163]