It’s a life of TV fame and (sometimes) soup-can meals

(This is mainly for people in the Lansing, Mich., area, but should be of interest to others, especially “Shameless” fans. Jim Hoffmaster, who did 69 episodes of that show, is the subject of a fascinating documentary. It’s returning to Lansing for a week at the Studio C theater, beginning at 6:15 p.m. Friday, Jan. 27. With that in mind, I’m repeating this story, from a few months ago.)
Here are some moments in the life of a successful TV actor. Jim Hoffmaster was:
— Visiting his alma mater, Durand (Mich.) High School, when a young woman rushed in, grinning. She was meeting the guy who plays Kermit on “Shameless” – “my favorite character on my favorite show.”
— At a street fair in Lansing, Mich., doing one of his silly dances; the crowd cheered. “That’s as close as I’ve ever been to being mobbed,” he said later, by phone.
— And back home in Los Angeles, in a crowded studio apartment. No, he doesn’t have elegant dinner parties there. In fact, he never has guests … and he sometimes eats soup straight from the can.
Those scenes are in “Acting Like Nothing is Wrong,” the documentary that had two sold-out showings at the East Lansing Film Festival, winning the audience award for best documentary. The contrasts will surprise viewers … as they surprised the filmmaker.
“He warned me what his apartment was like,” said director Jane Rosemont, “but it was still a bit of a shock.”
She’s bringing the film back to the Studio C thater for a one-week run, stasrting at 6:15 p.m. Jan. 27, and will be there the first three nights. Her film raises a key question: “What does it mean to be successful?”
By most standards, Hoffmaster is thoroughly successful. He’s had guest roles on 25 TV shows and a recurring role on one: He was in 69 “Shameless” episodes, more than half the total.
That brings fame, but not buy-a-house money. “When I first got here,” he said from Los Angeles, “I would look at the big houses and think, ‘What would they do with all that space?’”
The documentary is a fascinating glimpse at an actor’s life – even if it isn’t what Rosemont had expected. “You have to go where the story leads you,” she said.
She had seen short films about foster care. “I thought I would have a different way to do it …. I could make it hopeful.” So she thought of Hoffmaster, who had told her stories about his foster-care childhood.
She started to make a short film (her fourth) and soon had much more.
Eventually, they were flying to West Virginia to meet some relatives and some maybe-relatives. He also received his old case files, including one that said: “He is retarded, (but) he can still be educated.”
What emerged was a portrait of someone who desperately wanted positive attention. He got it in Durand, where he was considered a good reader – “I thought of myself as an intellectual,” he recalled by phone – and then an actor. After a summer theater workshop at Michigan State University, he decided he would be an actor. “I don’t remember having an alternative.”
He planned to go to MSU, but “forgot the part where you work hard and get good grades.” Instead, he reached Lansing Community College at the perfect time. The theater program was thriving; in a triumphant, 1982 “Hair,” he was one of the naked stars.
He was Berger – the role that made Treat Williams a movie star. Back then, the long-haired Hoffmaster had a Treat-like flair; one young woman described him as the guy every girl wanted.
Hoffmaster laughed when he heard about that long-ago comment. He’s been told he has a mild form of Crouzon syndrome, in which the skull forms abnormally. A cruel foster father called him “Herman Munster”; Hoffmaster describes his face as “like a Picasso painting.”
But back then, he was a leading man. “The time I did ‘Hair’ was as much of a Lothario as I ever was,” he said. “I was trying to date three women. It did not turn out well.”
In 2001, he moved west to be a full-time actor. His car broke down, his money ran out, but he stayed.
His first good break was in a commercial, as a guy who needed a Bahamas vacation. It had him say “But I’m a happy guy” as sad-sack photos appeared onscreen.
There were lots of auditions, a few roles … and a casting director who liked him. On the second or third “Shameless” try, the guy “came out and said, ‘Jim. We are going to get you on the show.’”
He did. Kermit was only on one episode the first season, three the second and two the third. But then he became a steady comic force, a bar buddy to the shameless Frank (Willian H. Macy).
“Shameless” finally ended; so did Hoffmaster’s job at Weight Watchers, which didn’t need him for Covid-era virtual sessions.
But he persists. He was a pawnbroker in an “American Gigolo” episode and a priest in a low-budget horror film. He also did a food commercial
He keeps auditioning, keeps going to festivals. He keeps acting like nothing is wrong.