Charlie seemed to be interested in the idea of life moving faster as you age. And the fear of missed opportunities. In life, do you ever really know if you're missing an opportunity? No, you really don't. And you're never really finished either, unless the finish is dying, and you don't really want to think about that too much." Hoffman paused. "Synecdoche" clearly had resonance for him ... Caden Cotard seems to echo many of Hoffman's own internal debates and anxieties. "I took 'Synecdoche' on because I was turning 40, and I had two kids, and I was thinking about this stuff — death and loss — all the time," Hoffman continued. "The workload was hard, but what made it really difficult was playing a character who is trying to incorporate the inevitable pull of death into his art. Somewhere, Philip Roth writes: 'Old age isn't a battle; old age is a massacre.' And Charlie, like Roth, is quite aware of the fact that we're all going to die." (Source)

Merry Christmas back at ya, Phil!