Trailer
Plot summary
Michael Dorsey is a New York stage actor whose reputation for being difficult has left him unemployable. After his friend Sandy Lester fails an audition for the daytime soap opera Southwest General, Michael disguises himself as a woman, Dorothy Michaels, and reads for the same part. The producer Rita Marshall hires Dorothy, who plays the hospital administrator Emily Kimberly with an assertiveness that surprises the cast and crew. Michael intends to keep the job only long enough to raise the money for a play written by Jeff Slater, his roommate. Dorothy strikes up a friendship with his co-star Julie Nichols, a single mother involved with Ron Carlisle, the show's director.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Tootsie (1982)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Initially, George Hamilton was to play the lead and serve as an executive producer, with Elliott Gould, Chevy Chase and George Segal also considered. When Hamilton moved to another film, Zorro, The Gay Blade, the lead role was offered to Peter Sellers and Michael Caine.
- Hoffman suggested that Pollack play Michael's agent George Fields, a role written for Dabney Coleman. Pollack resisted, but Hoffman convinced him, and it was Pollack's first acting work in years.
- Hoffman was shocked to learn that makeup could let him credibly appear as a woman but never a beautiful one. His epiphany came when he realized that although he found Dorothy interesting, he would not have spoken to her at a party because she was not beautiful.
- The film was retitled Tootsie at Hoffman's suggestion, as a tribute to his mother, who used to throw him in the air and ask, "How's my Tootsie Wootsie?!"
- Hal Ashby became the director, but Columbia then forced Ashby to quit because of the threat of legal action that would ensue if his post-production commitments on Lookin' to Get Out were not fulfilled.
