William M. Hoffman born 12 April 1939.William M. Hoffman is an American playwright, editor and teacher.
New York City native Hoffman's earliest works either were mounted in small, experimental off-off-Broadway theatres or remained unproduced. It was not until 1985 that he achieved critical acclaim and public recognition when As Is, one of the first plays to focus on the AIDS epidemic, opened in New York City at the Lyceum Theatre, where it ran for 285 performances. Hoffman won a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding New Play and a Tony Award nomination for Best Play. The following year, he adapted the work for a television production directed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg.
In 1991, Hoffman was commissioned to write the libretto for the Metropolitan Opera's The Ghosts of Versailles in celebration of the company's centennial. A 1993 televised production earned him an Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Classical Music/Dance Programming.
As an editor at Hill and Wang, Hoffman promoted the careers of Lanford Wilson, Tom Eyen, and Joe Orton, among others, by including their plays in either his New American Plays series or his anthology, Gay Plays: A First Collection.
Hoffman currently is an Associate Professor of Theatre at Lehman College at The City University of New York.