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Remembering Philip Seymour Hoffman

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The GOP is a Terrorist Organization2/05/2014 1:20:33 pm PST

re: #1 HappyWarrior

one could never say that Mr. Hoffman was guilty of playing himself on screen.

I would disagree with that, in that any character played well draws on elements of that character the actor playing him or her already has. Whether you’re playing Ghandi, Mother Theresa, or Hitler, or anyone in between, there are aspects of the person you are playing that the writer has given them that you already have yourself. Martin Sheen spoke of this very thing in the documentary Hearts of Darkness, a documentary about the making of Apocalypse Now, when he was talking about the difficulty he had in playing Willard. He even told Coppola, “I don’t know this guy. I don’t know who he is,’ to which Coppola replied (in so many words), “Sure you do. That guy is you. Any guy you play is you.” So any time you see an actor doing work that is knocking you out, know that you’re seeing a true element of who that actor is in real life, even though the circumstances in the movie are make believe. The truly great actors are the ones who are willing and able to go there, and Mr. Hoffman was definitely in that group.