Often, you didn't even realize that Hoffman was in a film or video until you saw the credits roll at the end and you found yourself saying: "Oh my God, that was him?"
He tricked you like that. And he did it frequently.
So, as Hoffman became a well-known presence in feature films you found yourself working extra hard to spot him when he appeared.
Who can forget Hoffman in the film Capote? His performance left us all but breathless. We weren't at all surprised that he won an Oscar for that role.
We last saw Hoffman on screen in Moneyball and once again we were impressed with his performance, this time as baseball manager Art Howe. And we loved his take on so many other characters in Doubt, Charlie Wilson's War, Almost Famous, State and Main, The Talented Mr. Ripley, and other movies. But Hoffman was also an accomplished stage actor and director. He was multi-talented.
Such talent often brings obsession with it - the drive to succeed, the determination to be consumed by the character and the work, the will to risk everything, the total immersion in one's craft. And where there is obsession you will find the seeds of addiction. They just seem to go together.
Still, when we heard today that Hoffman had been found dead in his New York City apartment of an apparent overdose, we were surprised. We didn't know that this extraordinarily accomplished actor struggled with addictions to drugs, liquor and reportedly, heroin.
As we heard this tragic news we were reading actor Tom Sizemore's book By Some Miracle I Made It Out Of There. In it, Sizemore details his own road to addiction and his numerous attempts to get clean followed by periodic relapses. Now, tabloids are reporting that Sizemore has apparently fallen off the wagon once again.
And before Sizemore's book we read the Stacy Keach bio All In All. Fortunately, Keach seems to have put his cocaine addiction behind him. But, if you read his book and Sizemore's book you will see once again that addiction is an illness -- an insidious illness that one is called to do battle with every day of one's life. Addicts don't necessarily recover. Rather, they are recovering. And each day of recovery is a blessing -- a triumph, a small celebration.
The scourge of drugs is pervasive throughout our society. And it seems particularly prevalent in the entertainment industry, as it has been for as long as we can remember.
Worse yet, more and more it seems like heroin is ascendent once again and is becoming the drug of choice for suburban youth.
Others may not agree with us but we feel that all this should be a particular warning to those who look casually upon drug use and who advocate legalized marijuana.
How sad that this great actor's life was lost to drug addiction.
This is an incalculable tragedy.
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