Celluloid Heroes

When you’re talking to them, they seem like perfectly nice boys. To be frank, I’m much more concerned for my safety around Normal Mailer.

Back in the 1990s, there was a unfortunate epidemic of duplicate projects in Hollywood, plaguing us all with competing films about volcanoes, earth-killing asteroids and Wyatt Earp. If back then you would have informed me that the next time this phenomenon surfaced, the subject would be author Truman Capote, I would have driven you to the Betty Ford clinic myself.

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Ever since I was a child, folks have thought they had me pegged, because of the way I am, the way I talk. And they’re always wrong.

Capote is a film that literally hangs on the performance of its star, so it’s a good thing that Philip Seymour Hoffman completely vanishes into the role of author Truman Capote. Without Hoffman’s presence, I’m afraid that this film wouldn’t hold together. It certainly wouldn’t have held my attention.

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