Tootsie made Dustin Hoffman realize he was brainwashed about female beauty

The early 80’s film Tootsie in which Dustin Hoffman takes on a female persona in order to find work is considered by many critics to be a comedic classic. For Hoffman, taking on the role, and putting on the dress, it became much more than that as it opened his eyes to the impossible standards of beauty women often feel they must try to live up to.

In a 2012 interview with the American Film institute that was recently unearthed by TheMarySue, Hoffman discussed how the role affected how he viewed women. He insisted that if he were going to take the role that he first find out if he could pass as a woman. When he first saw himself in full makeup he thought “now you have me looking like a woman, now make me a beautiful woman, because I thought I should be beautiful.”

The makeup artists informed the actor that what he saw was as good as it was going to get and it was at that moment that Hoffman said he had an epiphany:

I went home and started crying. Talking to my wife, I said I have to make this picture, and she said, “Why?” And I said, “Because I think I am an interesting woman when I look at myself on screen. And I know that if I met myself at a party, I would never talk to that character because she doesn’t fulfill physically the demands that we’re brought up to think women have to have in order to ask them out.” She says, “What are you saying?” And I said, “There’s too many interesting women I have…not had the experience to know in this life because I have been brainwashed.”

During his explanation, the two-time Academy Award winner got extremely emotional and at the end of the clip he paused in his speech to gather himself adding, “That [the role and the film] was never a comedy for me.

Hoffman has been married to wife Lisa since 1980 and the couple share 4 children together.