Dustin Hoffman

Happy Birthday to Dustin Hoffman! He emerged as a key figure in the Hollywood Renaissance period of the 1960s and 1970s, personifying identifiable misfits and antiheroes in films embraced by a new breed of filmgoer. After struggling on and off Broadway, the Strasberg-trained actor rocketed to fame as the star of director Mike Nichols' seminal The Graduate (1967). Chameleon-like characters in such diverse efforts as Midnight Cowboy (1969), Little Big Man (1970), Straw Dogs (1971), Papillon (1973), Lenny (1974), Straight Time (1978) and Agatha (1978). solidified his growing reputation. The one-two punch of the hits All the President's Men (1976) and Marathon Man (1976) proved Hoffman could deliver at the box office as well. More so than any other actor of the period, he pleased critics and fans alike with his performances in Kramer vs. Kramer (1979), Tootsie (1982) and Rain Man (1988), winning Best Actor Oscars for two of these three nominated performances. He began his career by appearing in an episode of Naked City in 1961. His first theatrical performance was 1961's Shmem needs a shink as Ridzinski. Following several guest appearances on television, he starred in the 1966 play Eh?; his performance garnered him both a Theatre World Award and Drama Desk Award. He returned to stage acting with a 1984 performance as Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman – Hoffman reprised the role a year later in a television film. 1987 saw the release of originally ill-received comedy Ishtar, in which he starred with Warren Beatty; its critical support has since grown, and it has become a bona fide cult film. In 1989, he was nominated for a Tony Award and a Drama Desk Award for playing Shylock in a stage performance of The Merchant of Venice. In the 1990s, he made appearances in such film as Warren Beatty's action comedy adaptation Dick Tracy (1990), Steven Spielberg's Hook (1991) as Captain Hook, guest starred in the 1991 "Lisa's Substitute" episode of The Simpsons, Period drama Billy Bathgate (1991), the Geena Davis comedy Hero (1992), medical disaster Outbreak (1995), legal crime drama Sleepers (1996), thriller Mad City (1997), the satirical black comedy Wag the Dog (1997) alongside Robert De Niro and the sci-fi horror film Sphere (1998) with Sharon Stone. In the 2000s, he was in the John Grisham adaptation Runaway Jury (2003), he played theatrical producer Charles Frohman in Finding Neverland, was in the all-star I  Huckabees, co-starred in the comedy Meet the Fockers (all 2004) as Bernie Focker, the fantasy thriller Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (2006), starred with Will Ferrell in Stranger than Fiction (2006), played the title character in the family comedy Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium (2007). Hoffman has acted in the Kung Fu Panda franchise since 2008 and reprised his role as Focker in Little Fockers (2010). He starred in the HBO drama series Luck, which was cancelled after one season due to animal safety concerns and made his directorial debut in 2012 with Quartet. He gave an Oscar worthy performance in The Meyerowitz Stories (2017), Hoffman appeared alongside Candice Bergen, Dianna Agron and Simon Helberg in As They Made Us directed by Mayim Bialik and will star alongside Sissy Spacek and his son Jake Hoffman in Sam & Kate, directed by Darren Le Gallo, which began filming in February 2022. In September 2021, he was attached to feature comedy film Mr. Shaw Goes to Hollywood as co-founder of MGM studio, Louis B Mayer. Filming would tentatively commence fall 2021. After meeting in 1963, Hoffman married Anne Byrne in May 1969. He adopted Karina (b. 1966), Byrne's child from a previous marriage, and with Byrne had daughter Jenna (born October 15, 1970). In 1970 Hoffman and Byrne were living in Greenwich Village in a building next door to a townhouse occupied at the time by members of the Weathermen, when a bomb was accidentally detonated in the townhouse's basement, killing three. In the 2002 documentary The Weather Underground, Hoffman can be seen standing in the street during the aftermath of the explosion. The couple divorced in 1980.He married businesswoman Lisa Gottsegen in October 1980; they have four children: Jacob Edward (born March 20, 1981), Rebecca Lillian (b. March 17, 1983), Maxwell Geoffrey (born August 30, 1984), and Alexandra Lydia "Ali" (born October 27, 1987). Hoffman has two grandchildren. In an interview, he said that all of his children from his second marriage had bar or bat mitzvahs and that he is a more observant Jew now than when he was younger. He has also lamented that he is not fluent in Hebrew.