
Philip Seymour Hoffman’s son said in a new interview that the thought of his late father seeing him on screen terrifies him. “As much as I would love him to be here and talk to him about acting, I also would be terrified to have him see my stuff and judge my stuff,” Cooper Hoffman told GQ. The 22-year-old added that his Oscar-winning father “was a very empathetic person, and he would probably—hopefully—hold my hand through all of it.” He added, “I would love his advice. And I would also just love my dad.” Hoffman was 10 years old when his father died of a drug overdose midway through filming the final Hunger Games movie. Hoffman told GQ that he initially resisted following his father’s lead into acting, but that director Paul Thomas Anderson, who cast a young Philip Seymour Hoffman in Boogie Nights, urged him to audition for his 2021 film Licorice Pizza. That performance earned Hoffman a Golden Globe nomination and paved the way for roles in Wildcat (2023) and Saturday Night (2024). Later this year, he’ll appear in The Long Walk, an adaptation of Stephen King’s 1979 dystopian novel, and he’s also set to portray OpenAI president Greg Brockman in an upcoming Sam Altman biopic.