Philip Seymour Hoffman

This is taken from an interview by Rebecca Murray entitled “Philip Seymour Hoffman Talks About ‘Capote’” found on http://movies.about.com/

Philip Seymour Hoffman on Preparing to Play Truman Capote:

Hoffman said he viewed documentary footage while preparing for his starring role in "Capote." “I had a great documentary by the Maysles [Albert and David] called 'With Love from Truman' that was kind of my bible, actually. I really watched that a lot because I thought that encapsulated a lot of things I needed to know. It was him at that time, it was before he completely disintegrated into what he eventually became, which is a man who died of alcoholism and stuff. So it was still him in that time. They caught him privately and you really got to see a simpler guy, not a guy who was on. So, it was helpful.”

Philip Seymour Hoffman on the Line Between Imitation and Interpretation:

“It's not a literal thing, you know what I mean? Everything, if you give yourself over to it, eventually transcends into something artistic and that's always a world that is a bit gray and indefinable. You do all the kind of concrete work that you can do, the documentaries or the audio tapes or the visuals or what you read, you interview people. I keep saying I put myself alone in a room four months before we started to shoot and tried to get in that room everyday for an hour or two with all these materials that I had and everything I could, and just start working. And what that is, is something that I had to figure out. A lot of it was practice and things like that of technical stuff. But ultimately all that had to be one. Where it wasn't just imitation, it wasn’t just mimicry, it was creating a character. A real guy and it was trial an error.”

Philip Seymour Hoffman on “In Cold Blood:”

Hoffman says he didn’t read “In Cold Blood” until after he read the “Capote” script. “I wasn't assigned it like most people. People were like, ‘Oh, I read that in college.' I read other things. And so there was a lot of Capote reading I had to do.”

Did Capote Use the Convicts?

“You know, I had to play him so I really didn't spend too much time on my own objective [looking] at it and still going, 'Oh, did he…?' I immediately started to try and look at it through the eyes of Capote. I don't think ultimately, I think he drew them in anonymous light. In that book I think it's somewhat of an empathetic light. In that book, it makes them very real people. You really do get an idea of Perry Smith's background and [Richard] Hickock's background. There is a certain compassion toward these two killers in that book. So that I realized [that] and that was pretty vivid. That tells you a lot about, obviously, how close he got to them.”

On Remaining in Character During the Shoot:

“I didn't really go to shops and stuff, I really didn't. That would have been really frightening, I think. At work, because it was like an athletic event in a way, very specifically meaning that if you are running a race you don't want to stop in the middle of the race and have to start running again. It's harder to do that. Trainers will tell you that's how you should work out because you will burn more calories because it takes more energy. I had to keep a certain sense of the voice and quality and these things because if I let it go, it was just too much energy to get it back up again. Once the day is over, I can go home and be me. I needed to do that. I needed to rest. It's really that simple.”

This is best performance by a male actor I have ever seen - I don’t even have words to describe it, one of the greatest performances ever. After seeing “Capote”, I was interested in this actor I have never heard of, Philip Seymour Hoffman. I happened to find this interview.