Forty-five or so years ago when I was part of a production of "The Glass Manager," I asked the director,How can a person (Truman Capote) know so much about life yet not live it well?
His reply was something like, knowing how to do something and actually doing it are two different things.
And now we've learned that Phillip Seymour Hoffman, who won an Academy Award for playing Truman Capote, died yesterday in his Manhattan apartment from an apparent heroine overdose.
Ever since seeing "The Talented Mr. Ripley" I've been a huge fan of Hoffman. He always seemed to become the character he was playing. A couple of years ago I saw him in as the very creepy master in "The Master." Seriously disliked the movie and the character and had to keep reminding myself he was acting. Two relatively recent serious films that I loved and loved him in were "Doubt" where he played a priest and "The Savages" where he played a son who had to put his dad in a nursing home.
At lunch today Dave and I talked about how, since neither of us is prone to addiction, it's hard for us to truly understand how addiction can and does devastate so many lives. From what little I know about Phillip Seymour Hoffman as a person, he seemed like a good guy. Not "Hollywood" but New York apartment, subway riding, taking his kids to school kind of guy.
I'm sorry he's gone. His talent was immense.
***
