Dustin Hoffman ‘Violated By Technology’

Dustin Hoffman has won a $1.5m lawsuit against Los Angeles magazine and has been dubbed ‘one of our country’s living treasures’ by Judge Dickran Tevrizian to boot. The star of cross dressing comedy smash Tootsie took exception to a spoof fashion spread in the March 1997 issue in which a shot of him in his Oscar nominated role as Tootsie was digitally grafted to a model decked out in designer togs. The magazine took pictures of scenes from classic pictures and digitally updated them with contemporary clothing. Taking great exception to this sort of treatment the actor claimed that this had reduced him to the role of an unpaid mannequin. The magazine defended itself by claiming its constitutional rights under the first amendment but the judge was having none of it. Both sides are understandably miffed although the dress designer has received millions of dollars worth of free publicity, so we won’t give them the satisfaction by mentioning any names.