DUSTIN HOFFMAN IS RATZO RIZZO!!!

Today is Barbra Striesand's 71st birthday and in reading her bio in IMDB was this sentence: "[on Dustin Hoffman] We were in the same acting school when I was sixteen, seventeen years old. I used to baby-sit to get free acting lessons, and he was the janitor."  That is the same time I attended Allan Miller's private classes with Barbra.  That means both Barbra and Dustin were in my fucking class!  I was friendly with Streisand, she dated my best friend and hung out with our gang of Beatnik Actors who worshipped Marlon and studied with Miller.  Miller was a hot-shot teacher at The Actor's Studio but taught the method privately to avoid The Studio's stringent, subjective auditions.

I don't remember Hoffman being in my classes unless he was that skinny, creepy kid who looked like he never bathed and twitched around like a cockroach.  Holy shit!  The real fucking DUSTIN HOFFMAN IS RATZO RIZZO!!!

We did an exercise in class where you had to sing a nursery rhyme, but you could only use one note throughout and not get self-conscious in front of your peers.  It sounded terrible!  If you did it right all your discomfort came out emotionally in your voice.  Barbra nailed it every time because every time she did it, you cried.  I only had that reaction one other time towards another classmate, THE CREEP!  I dismissed it as "even a broken watch is right twice a day" but didn't realize I had a glimpse at a student's emerging greatness.

I should recuse myself because of that much later time at PJ Clarke's when my party was waiting for a table, standing for half an hour; and when one opens up, that great fucking asshole, Dustin Hoffman waltzes in and takes our fucking table! 

DUSTIN HOFFMAN IS RATZO RIZZO!!!