Dustin Hoffman did not have a great time on the set of "The Graduate."
In an excerpt from his upcoming memoir "Look at Me" published in The New Yorker on Oct. 31, the Oscar-winning actor, 89, detailed why making the 1967 classic was a nightmare for him.
In the article, titled "Surviving 'The Graduate,'" Hoffman said he felt miscast in the lead role and that it was apparent throughout filming that the director, Mike Nichols, regretted hiring him.
"It was a terrible experience making the movie that changed my life," he wrote. "The whole time, I felt Mike was angry at me, either because I was doing something wrong or because he had realized what everybody else already knew, that he had miscast the lead in his film."
From the beginning of the process,
Hoffman said working on the movie "exacerbated all my insecurities." He didn't want to try out in the first place because he thought he was "all wrong" for college graduate Benjamin Braddock, but his agent convinced him to do so.
During his screen test, Hoffman kept thinking about how "I was no leading man" and didn't belong there. "It wasn't just paranoia: everyone thought I was wrong for the part," he wrote, adding that "stunned is too weak a word" to describe his reaction when he ended up getting cast.
During rehearsal, Nichols was "wonderful," so Hoffman said it was "shocking" and "destabilizing" when they started shooting and the director became "an entirely different person." Nichols was allegedly frequently in a "sour" mood and made comments that made Hoffman question his acting abilities and put him in a "state of constant anxiety."
"Mike was irritable with everyone, but with me a certain sadism seemed to creep in," Hoffman wrote. "There was a scene in which Katharine Ross had to slap me, and he made us do twenty-seven takes. The scene has Benjamin run into Elaine's room, soaking wet from the rain, to tell her that he's had an affair with an older woman; within seconds, Elaine realizes the woman is her mother. Mike just kept telling Katharine to hit me, to hit me harder. Katharine worried she would hurt me, and I told her, 'I'm O.K. Just don’t hit my ear.' Unfortunately, she missed a few times. I was dizzy by the end of that day, and Mike didn't even use the slap in the film."
In another incident, while filming an underwater scene in a pool, Hoffman "punctured an eardrum" due to "all the slapping during the previous day and all the water pressure at the bottom of the pool." All in all, the experience was so bad that Hoffman initially vowed that he would "never make another movie again for the rest of my life."
Needless to say, he did not stick to that promise: "The Graduate" launched Hoffman's career and became a beloved American classic, earning seven nominations at the Academy Awards, including best picture and best actor for Hoffman. Nichols, who died in 2014, won the Oscar for best director.
Hoffman did not win the best actor Oscar for "The Graduate," but he went on to win the award twice, for "Kramer vs Kramer" and "Rain Man." His memoir, "Look at Me," hits bookshelves on Nov. 10.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Why Dustin Hoffman had a 'terrible' time making 'The Graduate'
