A director from over here who did rather well over there. During rehearsals for Marathon Man, to acquire the appropriate look of dishevelment Dustin Hoffman went a fortnight without sleep and hired a brace of Teamsters to beat him up with assorted plumbing. Upon his arrival at the studio, Larry Olivier looked him up and down and exclaimed ‘Good heavens! I should take a taxi next time if I were you.’ Thoroughly crushed by this elegant bon mot, Hoffman went into a six-week sulk that cost the production $2.1 million. Michael Parkinson writes: ‘Anecdotes that priceless are worth every penny!’
