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Dustin Hoffman turns 85 | NDR.de – Culture

Status: 08/08/2022 12:03 p.m

Dustin Hoffman can look back on a long career and many successes at the age of 85 – the film business is not over yet. “As They Made Us,” a film in which he plays a terminally ill father, will be released later this year.


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by Catherine Wilhelm

Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford in The Untouchables (1976)

From “The Graduate” to “Kramer vs. Kramer” to “Rain Man” – acting has something therapeutic for him, when he plays someone else, he only feels comfortable in his own skin, says Dustin Hoffman in a recent interview with actress Mayim Bialik , known from the TV show “Big Bang Theory”. In the podcast, Hoffman takes a critical look back – especially at his childhood, which wasn’t nice because of his strict father: “I didn’t enjoy my childhood, I think I experienced it in my absence because the present was painful.”
The way out was acting.

Hoffman becomes a movie star by accident

Dustin Hoffmann (left) and Tom Cruise in a scene from the film “Rain Man”.

Born in Los Angeles, Hoffman made his first attempts at the Pasadena Playhouse, then studied acting at the renowned Lee Strasberg School in New York. By chance he becomes a movie star because Robert Redford turns down the role for the movie “The Graduate”. He promptly received his first Oscar nomination. He later appeared in front of the camera with Robert Redford in “The Untouchables” about the Watergate affair. The western satire “Little Big Man”, the comedy “Tootsie” or “Marathon Man” follow. Hoffman received his first Oscar in 1980 for his role in the divorce drama “Kramer vs. Kramer” with Meryl Streep, the second followed in 1989 for “Rain Man” opposite Tom Cruise.

Harassment allegations against Hoffman

Privately, Hoffman was very quiet for a long time, he enjoyed a clean image, but it was scratched in 2017. At that time, the US author Anna Graham Hunter had in a guest column in the Hollywood Reporter magazine allegations that Hoffman had repeatedly molested her in 1985 as a 17-year-old. Other women reported similar things, with Hoffman apologizing that this was not behavior that “reflected” him. Hoffman answered questions in the Mayim Bialik Podcast, but did not go into this chapter – probably also because Hoffman starred in her directorial debut called “As They Made Us” – as a terminally ill father. He hopes for a long life, his brother is over 90 and still fit so that he can follow in his footsteps to defy death because it is always “the enemy”, according to Hoffman.

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NDR Culture | Classic in the day | 08/08/2022 | 6:40 a.m


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