Victor Buono would make the perfect Haviland Tuf.
Except for the whole being dead thing. 
I’d have said Orson Welles was the best dead celeb for the role, with Marlon Brando a close second.
God I watched the Outer Limits adaptation of Sandkings. It was awful, it made me wonder how the tv show ever got picked up.
Among living actors, Phillip Seymour Hoffman would probably get the part, and do as excellent a job as always.
I don’t think PSH is big enough for the part. It needs a tall fat dude. Orson and Marlon are too serious for the role. Even at his most severe, Tuf was a bit…disconnected.
Side note: I named our first cat after one of Tufs: Havoc.
Fat suits are pretty realistic these days, but PSH might not really be tall enough. While Tuf is written as tall, I don’t think that it’s an essential part of him. Tuf’s aversion to being touched by humans, and his vegetarianism, and his moral stances, are all more defining, IMO.
Linky no worky. And I do remember wondering if Havoc was named after one of Tuf’s cats. I have a Chaos kitty, myself.
I had this same WTF moment a couple of years ago when I was scouring the internet for some of my best-recalled stories from Omni magazine (which is where I’m guessing you read it as well?).
PSH can be as big as the part requires him to be. He’s a very gifted actor.
But fine - how about Vincent d’Onofrio? Tall? Check. Fat? Check. Twitchy? Definitely.
Or, as Martin himself suggests, plump, bald and talented Irish actor Conleth Hill (see post 20).
Tuf isn’t twitchy - he’s frustratingly slow and ponderous to those around him. He’s also hairless, which D’Onofrio apparently can’t do - he’s had a 3-day growth for about a decade now.
He was pretty clean shaven in Full Metal Jacket. But, yeah, what was the deal in Law and Order:CI? I’m too intense and focused on the crimes to shave?
You can find all the short stories mentioned here in Dreamsongs. It’s a really good retrospective with some a lot of biographical sketches from Martin between the stories which I really liked. I’d read “Sandkings” as a kid and remembered it, but I now think it’s only in the top five stories in Dreamsongs, it’s certainly not head and shoulders above the rest of Martin’s work.
Gollancz has reissued *Tuf Voyaging * in paperback, which is certainly worth picking up.
Huh, my vague memory was that it was fairly long for a short story. Maybe it’s just that the protagonist was thoroughly unpleasant and I didn’t particularly enjoy the story.
“Sandkings” is a novelette, meaning it’s from 7500 t0 17,500 words (according to Hugo/Nebula rules). Short stories are under 7500. so it’s a longer story that most short stories.
I think he’s just one of those guys who looks like he needs a shave five minutes after he shaves.
I’m not familiar with Haviland Tuf.
OTOH, some of the actors named inspired me to think of Stephen Fry. Would he be suitable?
He’s an obese, pallid, hairless near-giant.
Conleth Hill(the actor who plays Varys on Game of Thrones) is actually pretty close to my mind. A foot or two taller and he’d be perfect.
If Pierluigi Collinahas grown a couple of feet and gained around two hundred pounds (and is interested in acting) he’d be even better.
Fry would actually work, with a shaved head/bald cap, as the character is intelligent, erudite, pasty-pale and large.
Yes, I could see Stephen Fry in the role, although he’d have to be a lot more phlegmatic than he is in most of his roles.
I haven’t seen Hill’s acting (we don’t have any premium cable channels) but he sure LOOKS like I’ve always pictured Tuf.
I just hope that if Tuf is made, they do it right. I’m tired of people who have no clue about fantasy and science fiction trying to make films in the genre. Do I dare mention Earthsea?