Veteran, Academy Award winning actor Dustin Hoffman is about to get behind the camera for the first time. The Daily Mail Online is reporting that Hoffman is in the final stages of negotiations to direct Quartet, based on a 1999 play by Ronald Harwood. Harwood, who won a Best Adapted Screenplay Academy Award for Roman Polanski’s The Pianist, is adapting his own play for the screen.

The project features Maggie Smith, Albert Finney and Tom Courtenay and is set in a retirement home for opera singers. Finola Dwyer (An Education) is expected to produce

72-year-old Hoffman’s career has spanned over four decades. He began acting on the stage and has gone on to star in an array of classic movies that include, but are not limited to, The Graduate (1967), Midnight Cowboy (1969), Lenny (1974), Marathon Man (1976), Kramer vs. Kramer (1979), Tootsie (1982) and Rain Man (1988). He won Best Actor Oscars for his Kramer vs. Kramer and Rain Man performances and has also won 6 Golden Globes. Currently he is filming the screen adaptation of Mordechai Richler’s novel, Barney’s Version, alongside Paul Giamatti.

Meanwhile, The Mail says Hoffman, 72, has always wanted to direct. Dream fulfilled. Shooting starts later this year.