With his Oscar sitting – well, wherever he’s put it (we’d like to guess a shelf in the toilet) – Philip Seymour Hoffman certainly isn’t short of a bit of work.
In fact, he has two new films to keep him busy in the coming months. First, he’s snagged a leading role in Sidney Lumet’s jewellery robbery/family crisis drama Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead. Hoffman has signed on for the lead role of Ethan Hawke’s elder brother, as they hatch a plan to rob their parent’s gem store. But the crime goes badly wrong and tragedy strikes. Albert Finney and Marisa Tomei are in the cast too, playing the brothers’ father and Hawke’s wife. Lumet starts shooting in New York next month.
Once he’s finished with the thieving life, Hoffman will move on to dodgy politics, in the role of a CIA agent who helps a crooked congressman to sell arms to Afghan rebels in the 1980s. Charlie Wilson’s War is shaping up to be one of the higher profile projects to happen along in Hollywood for a while – to directed by Mike Nichols, it’s a passion project for Tom Hanks and also stars Julia Roberts. Oh, and it has a script written by no lesser talent than Aaron West Wing/A Few Good Men Sorkin. The War starts in October.