Personal info
Known for
Actor
Gender
Male
Date of Birth
1967-07-23
Location
New York, United States
Edit pagePhilip Seymour Hoffman
Biography
Philip Seymour Hoffman (July 23, 1967 – February 2, 2014) was an American actor. Known for his distinctive supporting and character roles—eccentrics, underdogs, and misfits—he acted in many films and theatrical productions, including leading roles, from the early 1990s until he died in 2014. He was voted one of the 50 greatest actors of all time in a 2022 readers' poll by Empire magazine.
Hoffman studied acting at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts. He gained recognition for his supporting work, notably in Scent of a Woman (1992), Boogie Nights (1997), Happiness (1998), The Big Lebowski (1998), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), and Almost Famous (2000). He began to occasionally play leading roles, and for his portrayal of the author Truman Capote in Capote (2005), won the Academy Award for Best Actor.
Further Oscar nominations came for playing a brutally frank CIA officer in Charlie Wilson's War (2007), a priest accused of child sexual abuse in Doubt (2008), and the charismatic leader of a Scientology-type movement in The Master (2012).
While he mainly worked in independent films, including The Savages (2007) and Synecdoche, New York (2008), Hoffman also appeared in Hollywood blockbusters, such as Twister (1996) and Mission: Impossible III (2006). He played Plutarch Heavensbee in the Hunger Games series (2013–2015), in one of his final roles.
The feature Jack Goes Boating (2010) marked his debut as a filmmaker. Hoffman was also an accomplished theater actor and director. He joined the off-Broadway LAByrinth Theater Company in 1995, where he directed, produced, and appeared in numerous stage productions.
Hoffman received Tony Award nominations for his performances in the Broadway revivals of Sam Shepard's True West (2000), Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night (2003), and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman (2012).
Known for
Actor
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 as Plutarch Heavensbee
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 as Plutarch Heavensbee
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire as Plutarch Heavensbee
Mission: Impossible III as Owen Davian