Watching the dailies with director Barry Levinson early in the shoot of Rain Man, Dustin Hoffman saw a performance that, he writes, felt “totally fake.” He came close to walking away from the 1988 role that would win him his second Oscar.
Hoffman, 89, tells the story in his new memoir, Look at Me, which Simon Six published on Nov. 10 and which he wrote with New Yorker staff writer Ariel Levy. “I almost quit Rain Man because I couldn’t find the character,” he writes. Levinson, now 84, stayed calm and gave him a deal: stick with it for a couple more weeks, and quit then if Raymond Babbitt still wasn’t there. The director asked him to “find one moment that feels authentic,” according to the memoir.
That moment arrived in a car with Tom Cruise, who played Raymond’s younger brother, Charlie. Hoffman writes that he froze in the middle of the scene and had no idea how Raymond was thinking, so he simply repeated one word. “So I just kept saying, ‘Yeah. Yeah,'” he recalls. He walked away from the take convinced he had ruined it, felt depressed and apologized to Levinson. The director saw it differently and told him he had found something.
The playback proved Levinson right. “That was it. That was the guy,” Hoffman writes, describing Raymond as overwhelmed, intensely focused and unsure of himself, trying hard to do what was expected of him without understanding what that was. From there, he gradually built confidence by improvising with Cruise, USA Today reported after reading the book.
Related: Dustin Hoffman Calls Cocaine ‘the Greatest Drug’: Why He Had to Stop
The film that nearly lost its star went on to sweep the top categories at the Oscars. Rain Man won the Oscar for best picture, Levinson won best director, writers Barry Morrow and Ronald Bass took home the screenplay prize, and the film earned $172 million at the domestic box office. Hoffman’s performance as an autistic savant brought him his second best actor Oscar, following his win for Kramer vs. Kramer.
Rain Man is not the only classic that left Hoffman doubting himself. In the same book, he describes making The Graduate in 1967 as a terrible experience and says he often felt he was about to be fired by director Mike Nichols. He has been promoting the memoir this week, including a sit-down with Willie Geist on TODAY on the day it was released.
Nearly four decades later, Raymond Babbitt remains one of the defining roles of Hoffman’s career, a performance that began with an actor ready to walk away. It took two weeks of patience from Levinson and a single improvised word during a car scene with Cruise to turn the character he once called fake into the performance that earned him an Academy Award.
?SIGN UP for Parade’s Daily newsletter to get the latest pop culture news & celebrity interviews delivered right to your inbox?
Hence then, the article about dustin hoffman almost quit rain man until one scene with tom cruise was published today ( ) and is available on Parade ( Saudi Arabia ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Dustin Hoffman Almost Quit ‘Rain Man’ Until One Scene with Tom Cruise )
Also on site :
- Lutnick under fire: How Trump’s commerce secretary cultivated Nvidia’s CEO while chip controls slipped
- What channel is Spain v England Nations League match on? TV coverage, live stream and kick-off time
- Son of ex-Alamo Rent a Car owner went from hip hop label founder to lithium leader. He’s even eyeing the White House