HOFFMAN, DUSTIN

HOFFMAN, DUSTIN (1937– ), U.S. actor. Born in Los Angeles, California, his role in The Graduate (1967), his first motion picture performance, was considered the year's most significant screen debut. Hoffman was nominated for a Best Actor Academy Award for The Graduate, as well as for subsequent films Midnight Cowboy (1969), Lenny (as Lenny Bruce, 1974), Tootsie (1982), and Wag the Dog (1997). Hoffman won Best Actor Oscars, as well as Golden Globe Awards, for his performances in Kramer vs. Kramer (1979) and Rain Man (1988). His other films include Little Big Man (1970), Straw Dogs (1971), Papillon (1973), All the President's Men (as Carl Bernstein, 1976), Marathon Man (1976), Straight Time (1978), Agatha (1979), Ishtar (1987), Family Business (1989), Billy Bathgate (as Dutch Schultz, 1991), Hook (1991), Hero (1992), Outbreak   (1995), Sphere (1998), Moonlight Mile (2002), Finding Neverland (2004), I Heart Huckabees (2004), Meet the Fockers (2004), and The Lost City (as Meyer Lansky, 2005). Among his many other awards and nominations, Hoffman won an Emmy and a Golden Globe Award for Best Lead Actor for his portrayal of Willy Loman in the 1985 TV movie Death of a Salesman. In 1997 he won the Golden Globe's Cecil B. DeMille Award for his outstanding contribution to the entertainment field. Hoffman was entered into The Guinness Book of World Records under the heading "Greatest Age Span Portrayed by a Movie Actor" for his role in Little Big Man, where he played the character Jack Crabb from age 17 to age 121. Also successful on the Broadway stage, Hoffman performed in such plays as The Subject Was Roses (1964), Jimmy Shine (1969), Death of a Salesman (1984), and The Merchant of Venice (as Shylock, 1990), for which he was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Actor. -ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: R. Bergan, Dustin Hoffman (1991); M. Freedland, Dustin: A Biography of Dustin Hoffman (1989); P. Agan, Hoffman vs Hoffman: The Actor and the Man (1987); D. Brode, The Films of Dustin Hoffman (1983). (Jonathan Licht / Ruth Beloff (2nd ed.)