PHILIP Seymour Hoffman was a hard act to follow, considering that his performance as the writer Truman Capote won him the Best Actor Oscar. As a British actor, Toby Jones was all the more daunted when he was cast for the role in a rival production, but he spoke yesterday of how he had risen to the challenge.

Jones, the star of Kenneth Branagh’s Olivier award-winning comedy The Play What I Wrote, said that as soon as he had mastered Capote’s high-pitched, eccentric voice — “a strange amalgam of forces” — he knew he could also get the character.

He refused to allow himself to be intimidated or distracted by Seymour Hoffman’s portrayal in Capote, instead immersing himself in his own research for the film Infamous.

The “biopic”, which is having its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival, is a study of the complex and tortured relationship between Capote and Perry Smith, one of the murderers about which the author wrote his so-called non-fiction novel, In Cold Blood.

Jones plays opposite Daniel Craig, who could not come to Italy as he is still working on his debut film as James Bond, as well as Sandra Bullock and Sigourney Weaver.

Douglas McGrath, the director and writer of Infamous, cast Jones after a “very long search”. He said: “We needed an actor capable of communicating the whole gamut of emotions. You’d be surprised by how hard that is to find.”

As soon as he met Jones in London, he knew that he was right for the part. They began shooting their version shortly after the rival production had finished.

Explore Film

• Film Reviews

• Trailers

• DVD

• London Film Festival

Editor's choice

• The 100 Best Films of the Decade
• 70 facts you didn't know about Marvel
• The 50 Biggest Movies Of 2010