Biography

Michael Hoffman grew up in Idaho and studied at Boise State University in his home state. Awarded a scholarship by the renowned Rhodes Foundation, Michael went to study at Oxford University in 1979, where he discovered the young Hugh Grant and shot his debut film with him: Privileged, a story about an upper class adolescent.

Together with Rick Stevenson, with whom he and others founded the Oxford Film Company after graduation, Michael created Restless Natives, a comedy about two Scotsmen who rob American tourist parties.

He attracted great attention in the US in 1988 with Promised Land, a dark coming-of-age story with Kiefer Sutherland and Meg Ryan in the leading roles. In 1991 he was entrusted with the $25 million comedy Soapdish – likewise, an all-star cast production: featuring Sally Field, Kevin Kline, Whoopie Goldberg, a very young Robert Downey Jr., and Terri Hatcher among others.

In 1995 Hoffman returned to British material with Restoration. The film celebrated its world premier in 1996 at the Berlin Film Festival. In the same year, Michael shot the romantic comedy One Fine Day with George Clooney and Michelle Pfeiffer. The internationally acclaimed Shakespeare adaptation A Midsummer Night´s Dream followed, as well as Game 6, a film starring Michael Keaton and Robert Downey Jr. in the leading roles, which is based on a screenplay by the successful author Don DeLillo and premiered at Sundance Festival in 2005.

Prior to The Last Station, Michael completed a pilot for HBO with and about the star journalist Seymour Hersh, and the documentary Out of The Blue: A Film About Life and Football.

Michael Hoffman is married to the screenwriter Sam Silva, he has three children and a distinctive sense of British humor.