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Despite his sudden near-ubiquity (six films in 1999, including Magnolia, The Insider, Cradle Will Rock, and The Talented Mr. Ripley; and nine in 1998, including Psycho, Enemy of the State, Rush Hour, and The Truman Show); his favoured-actor status with director Paul Thomas Anderson (Hall has appeared in the all three Anderson films: Magnolia, Boogie Nights, and Hard Eight, in the last of which he starred); and his consummate HITG! career (sixty-two movies since 1970), we'd wager dollars to donuts that the first thing most people think when they see Philip Baker Hall is, "Hey, it's that guy from Seinfeld." His role in 1990 as library detective Lt. Bookman was to Hall what Hannibal Lecter was to Anthony Hopkins -- a signature star turn late in life that vaults a previously little known actor in the consciousness of the public at large. (The virtuosic tongue-lashing Hall unleashed on Seinfeld for his failure to return an overdue book prompted a lengthy ovation from the live studio audience -- one which recalled the young Scott Baio's entrances on Happy Days.) The Seinfeld role was classic Hall: world-weary, wizened, and as crusty as undies on the third straight day. In fact, it's hard now to watch Hall doing his "let's-cut-the-bullspit" shtick in a movie like The Talented Mr. Ripley without feeling a bit like giggling.

With his prominent spot in Magnolia's ensemble, Hall's HITG! status is in jeopardy, though triple-namers usually take longer to gain name-recognition with the fans; it may be awhile before Philip Baker Hall is no longer being confused with Anthony Michael Hall, Philip Michael Thomas, and, of course, his own personal Medici, P.T. Anderson. Even so, we look forward to the day that his craggy visage adorns a plaque in the HITG! Hall of Fame, and the name Philip Baker Thomas Ogden Hyde Michael Steirs Hall is immortalized...forever.