Authenticity can make or break a movie about movies. And pretty much everyone, from cinematic novices to those with decades in the business, agree Get Shorty is about as authentic a look at show business as has ever been committed to film — straight down to its depiction of the megalomaniacal superstar Martin Weir, whose name alone can get a film an instant green light.
Get Shorty's authentic vibes undoubtedly stem from its source material, the novel of the same name from famed author Elmore Leonard. You may not realize it, but Leonard's Get Shorty is based on many of his own adventures meeting with Hollywood types eager to adapt his work. And yes, Leonard reportedly based the character of Martin Weir on one such person, an actor by the name of Dustin Hoffman.
Yes, that Dustin Hoffman, the two-time Oscar winning star of films like The Graduate, Midnight Cowboy, and Rain Man. As the story goes (via NJ.com), Leonard met with Hoffman in the 1980s to discuss an adaptation of the author's thriller LaBrava. That film never happened, but Hoffman clearly left an impression on Leonard, who not-so-slyly wrote a way over-the-top version of him into Get Shorty. And in a fittingly Get Shorty-esque twist almost too funny to fathom, Hoffman was among the actors offered the role of Chili Palmer when the adaptation was being cast.
