Tom Hanks Shares Stories from 40 Years in Hollywood, from “Splash” to “Forrest Gump” to “Elvis”

hey it's guyroz your host of the podcast the great creators where each week I talk about creativity with some of the most accomplished and iconic actors musicians and performers of our time Welcome to our new YouTube channel and you can find all of our conversations and videos right here you can click the Subscribe button and also the Bell to get notifications every time we post a new video okay I am super excited about the conversation you're about to hear and see it's with probably one of the greatest and most iconic actors of all time his name is Tom Hanks and if you're anything like me you've probably seen more Tom Hanks films than you can possibly imagine because he's done more than 80 films including some of the biggest most iconic films of all time big Forrest Gump Saving Private Ryan Philadelphia Toy Story Apollo 13 on and on and on most recently he's been getting some Oscar buzz for the character he played in the Elvis film uh Colonel Tom Parker who was of course Elvis's manager in my conversation with Tom Hanks you're going to find out about how not getting cast in a play actually ended up leading him to a hugely lucky break you'll hear how Tom learned the art of role-playing uh by horsing around with his siblings and also what he learned from his collaborations with directors like Ron Howard Robert zemeckis and of course Steven Spielberg our conversation starts in Northern California where Tom grew up he spent most of his childhood moving around his parents were actually divorced and he mainly lived with his dad and by the age of 10 Tom had lived in 10 different houses but he says it's something about all of that change actually seemed kind of exciting I want to start by asking you about your childhood because you it it's very similar to my wife's in the sense that you are her father was married three times her mother was married twice she has brothers and sisters from different marriages she moved around a lot it was a very unstable and disrupted childhood and yet she's the most emotionally stable person I've ever met in my life and so it's kind of amazing because sometimes people turn out that way and sometimes they don't and it seems to me that you kind of turned out that way right like you had this like textbook disruptive and disrupted childhood well every yeah everything but Child Services being called you know that that never happened we just moved around a lot because uh um my joke is that my parents pioneered the marriage dissolution laws for the state of California you know it's like they were right behind Zsa Zsa Gabor on their uh they got they got divorced I think in 1961 I was five I was three I was third of four kids uh my young my younger brother was an infant so um that he he ended up staying with my mom and we all went with uh my dad who was in the restaurant business and that's the reason we moved around so much the restaurant business is you know all but migrant you know um yeah somebody calls and say hey I need a guy they say well I can't because well we'll pay you this much next thing you know you're loading up the car and off you go and then you're there for a while and then he hates the owner and then he quits and makes a phone call and 48 hours later we're living we're living in a completely different city uh and without an awful lot of explanation that is going on we just we just kind of moved and I I you know my we all reacted to it I think in different ways my uh sister who was five years older she was very outgoing she had a big personality my older brother um is uh was shy and um uh not he is however the the funniest human being I've ever met and I was just the guy that was kind of like hey what's where are we going now hey this this ain't bad uh I had uh I had the joy Gene I guess and I I was never intimidated by starting a brand new school or living in a brand new you know we lived in every combination of of uh housing you could have you know big rental homes with a lot of people in it small apartments and vast apartment complexes with only the three of us we were latchkey kids uh we had uh step parents that were sometimes always home and not and we were also thrown on a Greyhound bus four times a year to go up and and uh spend time with my mom and uh in her small town America I mean literally like almost the human comedy kind of hot she was in in reading right well she started in Reading then moved to a town called Red Bluff California which is the county seat for Tehama County and but it was I mean honestly it was you you could have dropped Red Bluff in Kansas or um you know Missouri it was not like being in California at all except the license plates on the cars had a big the Sacramento River ran through it and we'd get on bikes and ride down to the river and pawn our money and go to the a w root beer stand and uh it was uh it was fun uh to save for the various confusions of the marital statuses of all my parents I had some we had a lot of Step um siblings who were all kind of great I mean we were always just this kind of big naught of kids on occasion but then there were other times there was nobody around except uh except us so by the time I'm 10 I've lived in 10 different homes in probably four different variations of The Brady Bunch meets My Three Sons by way of The Waltons and I was just one I I was just one of an awful lot of mouths at the at the table I knew what was I knew what time it was by what was on TV and um I liked going to school um so I I would say that we were pretty tight and um there was no malevolence there was no you know there was no alcoholism there was no slapping around there was no there was there was no sense of danger in any of the homes but but there was an awful lot of confusion because nobody talked about what was going on and maybe that was the key that there was no abuse or or drug and alcohol abuse because I mean you could you could look at at that upbringing in a number of different ways like we could be having a different conversation and you could be talking about your childhood traumas and your resentments and and I want and obviously you are an incredibly normal nice person who has a very stable family been a stable marriage for many years do you think it's a choice that that you made or that people make to not carry that baggage I think anybody that is in the in on the food chain of that type of family um it makes a very individual piece with um their status um uh I have I just I just recently my my stepmother uh passed away and she was a great love of my my father's life they were really they were the couple destined to be with each other and um I got together with my my step-sister um uh she's five years younger than I and we actually lived in the same house uh although on different levels sort of we had different entrances and we we have gone back and compared notes about those years of uh when when my parents first got married to when essentially we got old enough to move move on her way and in the comparing notes we just said oh yeah that was a really odd house they did a really rotten job as parents as inclusive We're All in This Together kind of thing they didn't do that they just there was no sense of We're All in This Together um what there was is oh where have you been and uh come to dinner uh that was pretty much it uh so the the what comes along after that um is if I was going to put it in in the way I took it was things magic always came along Magic by way of we are moving Magic by way of um we're leaving these people and we're gonna go start completely all over and when you're young and you think that life has a degree of permanence and that permanence is not necessarily great you know I'm not having a good time in this house in this school in this neighborhood yeah and then one of your parents comes in and says uh we're leaving and you hop in the car and you drive away and it is like Well that took care of that you know that's done right and now we'll go over to a new place and uh there's new furniture and there might be you know uh there's new friends to make and my joke is my dad would take the three of us out on the driveway and say well kids excuse me well kids uh your school is somewhere in that direction why don't you just walk that way and you see kids your own age follow them and they will lead you to the place where you're going to school from now on and now that's yeah that's a joke but it's not that far off so this concept of magic if the view just wait something new will come along and alter your your stature and your status and your time in your neighborhood so by the time look I've been married twice um uh uh the my kid's mom passed away uh just uh in 2002 um uh and uh Rita and I have been married well for 34 years and the you just end up having the same faith in that magic oh this magic occurred and here it is and um uh if we you sort of like finally land in a place that needs no altering yeah and I don't know if is that a is that a choice or is that just the natural flow towards you know what you desire um uh I would say that the uh it kind of like matches exactly what I do for a living which is inter room and seduce all people in it that's what I did uh every time I I would imagine that your wife went to an awful lot of schools and if that's if that's a socially uncomfortable um situation like it was I would say for my brother um that's that's an awful lot to adapt to that that ends up that ends up being an interior battle that you have to pursue I did not feel that I just kind of I started a brand new school in first grade and then I started a Brand New School in second grade and then halfway through second grade I began a brand new school and I stayed in that and then I began to another school in fifth grade and another one in seventh grade and um I just thought hey I I dig the mix man I knew I had friends who literally were living in the same house that they were born in and they were going to the same school and I honestly thought how can you stand that man yeah where's the variety in life you gotta you gotta go man I have plenty of uh Variety in life right now but uh I suppose I don't know if you're 10 or 11 or 14 years old and you're conscious of actually making a choice right um other than um how to how do I deal with the reality of what's going on here I'm wondering how how you as a teenager became interested in theater because you were I mean as a from from what I understand you were going Acro you grew up in Oakland basically and you're going across the bay to the city of San Francisco to like see the Iceman Cometh you know like which is pretty sophisticated stuff um for a teenager how did you get drawn to that was there teacher was there somebody it was yeah so it was a Skyline High School in Oakland and uh it's a three-year they have three year high schools in Oakland and so my sophomore year my first year in high school you're definitely you know low man on the totem pole and I I just thought high school that for my sophomore year was just like some bad version of every TV show you've ever seen about high school what do you do well you take chemistry and you run maybe you were on track and there's a there's a click and social hierarchy that maybe you take part of it and I I hung out with kind of like a spiritual crowd we talked about highfalutin things but as far as going to school itself it was just a place to to do time you know uh six periods six classes uh a level of disinterest but then uh friends of mine um were in a play the school play and uh I went to see my my pals in it and uh it was a real play I mean it was the big Auditorium and it was like like a theater and there was a set and there was lightings and there's people I knew up there and they were performing in Dracula and I just thought what is this where did this come from is this something you do in school and the next year I was in a quote-unquote drama class and my teacher was a man by the name of Raleigh Farnsworth and he was a he was a career educator of Theater Arts all his life he was gay and I didn't know that nobody did he was very well dressed and his hair was perfect and but he was he was a guy who found the great pleasure of teaching Drama We would we had a class uh the classroom actually had a stage in it with a curtain and rudimentary lights and when we would perform our assignments the lights in the in the room would go off and the only lights on would be up on the stage so it was like a little theater and it was just like a classroom for algebra or powermatics except it was there was a theater on the end of it yeah and I just thought I lucked into a scam that could get you through school this is a place where you come and you learn lines and you play around and uh none of it was homework and none of it was work and I that was the class that made me I couldn't wait to get to school every day because we were going to be doing some sort of scene work or some sort of a theater game or some sort of exercise and began right then and they're always having something that we were rehearsing and something that we were performing or watching somebody perform as well and uh if the if an educational process is go to this room and keep listening until you find something that fascinates you and then you will throw yourself into that because you know it could be accounting or you know it could be geography yeah it could be the thing that you end up making your life's work on and that was that I just I just saw that and I said this is the greatest way to go to school because this is what I do all the time anyway this is what I do on the bus at home goof around and say things yeah in his uh in his loud and as attention getting uh format as possible I know that you gotten to theater in high school and um and obviously you decide to pursue it after high school but I wonder like we've had guests on the show who are it's almost like they're division one athletes like they're like most professional athletes have at least one parent who played division one sports and a lot of actors like we had Sigourney Weaver on and her mother was a famous actor in Britain you know and and she she almost had it's like she has the gene right and you you didn't have any of that in your family and I wonder if there was a point in high school because you decided to pursue this when you left High School right so it seems like there must have been somebody who said to you Tom you're you're really good at this like you should pursue this thing because it's kind of a crazy decision to make I mean it is the least stable least promising career to pursue it's so hard to make a living and you I mean you must have I I'm assuming somebody said you know you should you should pursue this you're good at it uh I didn't know that it was a a living that you could pursue right uh oh I I okay I get doing doing plays in in high school the high school play you know that's that's that's part and parcel to you know Americana you know um I will say this that Mr Farnsworth was the guy who pegged me as the man with energy the guy who came into the room um the guy that you could just say uh just hit the on switch and I I took off now that came from Two and a half I will say this that came from two and a half years of my dad was not married he was working in the restaurant business my sister and my brother and I were all alone for most of the day right up through dinner and right up through going whatever our homework was and going to bed and all we did in this small apartment in Alameda California was goof around and entertain ourselves yeah and it and I was the youngest person and my sister was hilarious and my brother was hilarious and of course fists flew and you know screams were done and we all threw stuff at each other yeah but uh on a on a on your average Saturday Sunday and even on school nights we turned the doing of the laundry into a massive production or the making of a dinner into a hilarious sitcom we just did it naturally because we're just entertaining ourselves and there was no Governor you know there was nobody telling us what it what it was so that energy that I ended up discovering that there was a place to do it and Mr Farnsworth look he cast me as things where I was not the lead I was the energy of something now yeah we did two shows a year at in at Skyline we did a fall play and a spring Musical and uh that what the auditions for The Fall play and the spring musical would happen on a Wednesday and a Thursday and a Friday and the cast list would be posted on the drama classroom door on Monday I got no sleep at all Saturday and Sunday anticipating you know what might what I might be cast as never the lead but the guy who had to have energy I was Sir Andrew agucci and Twelfth Night who does 12th night in high school well he did it because we had a couple of people that were magnificent a couple of really talented uh young people that ended up doing it so that was high school um and then I was just going to Junior College because that's what I couldn't get into anything and so I was just going to Junior College and I ran into John gilkerson who had played Sebastian in uh 12th night and he was a true creature of the theater and he was a puppeteer he belonged to the international Guild of marionette artists when he was only 15 years old he was one of those guys that just lived this world of creativity much older than you know he was a Drama teacher there at the junior college no no no he was just a guy in class with me he was a classmate and at one point um we were we stayed in the Bay Area when everybody else went off to their universities and I ran into one and he says so what classes are you taking at Chabot c-h-a-b-o-t Chabot junior college and I said well I'm just taking sociology I'm just taking those those accredited classes in case you go on to a four-year University he says you're not taking any drama classes I said well no no I'm not he's a shame on you he literally said those words shame on you wow you should you should be taking drama classes and you should be doing shows shame on you and uh uh he rattled me and I and I realized that okay that that's a wonderful uh voted confidence but I also he he said it in a way that reminded me that I missed it so I missed I missed the juju uh being in a class and learning lines and being critiqued and having to perform for somebody so from that my I took a drama class every year uh every every excuse me every quarter when I was at Chabot after that and those drama classes were the Great Catalyst too getting out uh and seeing theater in San Francisco that was what was it what was unique about it guy Roz it was professional theater so I'm going to I'm seeing because it's a school assignment I'm seeing uh the Iceman Cometh at Berkeley Rep and I'm seeing desire under the Elms and pear gount and the merry wives of Windsor at act American Conservatory theater I'm going anywhere wow in order to see professional theater and that's when I this thing this gong went off in my head that says this is a job well this is a thing that these people are getting paid to do yeah um and I can't say right then I right then and there I did I just thought Ben bat would be a great job dad I had no idea of how to do it I was in college so then I decided maybe the thing to do is make Theater Arts my major in school yeah um and that uh I ended up doing that and I never finished College because I went off to another school and while I was there I did not this is this is the the most the truth is you can say um you know what was the secret to your career what was the first job you got and I said that's not nearly as important as the job I didn't get I was not I was not cast in a show at my State College in Sacramento and so all my friends were and so I had nothing to do except go audition for this other play that was being somewhere done somewhere in town and I ended up getting cast in that which was directed by Vincent Dowling of the Great Lake Shakespeare Festival in Cleveland who was hiring young people to go off and be interns in his company because in Cleveland because he needed bodies to move these sets around and also to carry Spears and have one lines and Hamlet and things like that so the the role you wanted do you remember the play that you didn't oh yeah I was not cast in Joe Orton's what the butler saw all my all my friends were yeah so you try out for a play that is also was also in that I think you were in Sacramento at the time yeah I was in Sacramento was it at a place that is now called I think it's called Sacramento actors theater it was called something else back then and it was the it was the Cherry Orchard uh a check off the Cherry Orchard okay so you you were casting this in this checkout flight had you not been casting that play your life would it's like the sliding doors right it's like you go left or you go right and you don't get this roll you get this other role it turns out the guy directing it is actually based in Cleveland and he runs this this Shakespeare Festival out there and he's there he's there because an act uh somebody in his company had come from the same Festival so he's there as a guest director wow and if I had been casting the in the play at College I would not have met the man I would not have played Yasha and he would not have said he was he's he says I want you I think you could I think you could be an actor I think you could if you want to be if you want to be you could be an actor and then he offered me offered me a job in which she didn't pay anything but from everything that I've read I mean that's really where you learned how to act you ended up going and moving to Cleveland for like two years I I did I ended up doing three seasons there uh then the first season um they needed somebody to round out the large cast of Taming of the Shrew and so I was cast out of the intern company as grumio along with Jan Acres who was also from Sacramento there was five of us that made the trip um and from that uh both of us had to go on tour uh on an Arts grant for the Ohio Arts Council and it just so happens that in order to do that every member of the company had to be an actor's equity and so these two people who uh were just interns were said okay you're going to be paid minimum you will pay the dues and you are now thanks to this card that is in your wallet you are now a professional actor and um I was invited I was invited back for the next season and uh made it another N1 it was during that second season as I met everybody who said okay all right kid so you're gonna keep doing this then you have to make a decision and that is where are you going to go after this season you're in Cleveland right now where are you going to go well uh you know my son Colin had been born uh there was a lot of there was all sorts of other you know otherworldly pressures but they uh my good friends George Maguire and Michael John McGann they who are still good friends of mine uh they said look if you're an actor there's only one place for an actor to be you have to go to New York yeah I've never been to New York I'd seen New York in the movies the closest I'd been to New York was Shaker Heights Ohio which is on the you know the east side of Cleveland that's the closest I've ever been to New York and um they shepherded me through the process of being broke and poor uh and on unemployment in New York City uh but they were right what happens is if you have that card in your wallet you do get to sort of audition for absolutely everything that goes on uh in the world uh theatrically and had I not done that um and I not followed their both advice and and enjoyed the benevolence of their Good Will of which was substantial um uh I wouldn't be talking to guy Roz today on the great creator you know um because I know you you got to New York around 1979 as you mentioned we moved there I moved there and yes I moved there in 78 yeah late seven seventy eight yeah 20 22 you had you had your first kid um and you are moving there to become a stage actor right I mean that is your Pursuit you're not you're not thinking television you're thinking I'm going to go go and become a stage actor and uh and what do you remember I mean that that that was a right what do you remember about that time and we think about the late 70s early 80s in New York City and it was if you if you just picture a taxi driver uh yeah Robert De Niro that's that's what New York City was the Warriors you know Walter Hills movie The Warriors that was that was literally that was like playing in I lived just off Times Square and this terrible little little place but actually with some uh with some uh benevolent folks that were in it but uh uh yeah it was uh I got very lucky because um I did not have to take a regular job because 25 weeks of work in Ohio uh with a contract um uh qualified me for 25 weeks of unemployment from the state of Ohio right so I was getting I did not have to wait tables I did not have to get that kind of job um I was able just to eventually go in and sign and and barely survive yeah I remember we we had these big long discussions about how many deductions do you take on your weekly paycheck and there are and I said zero because I fought I was following the example of of France take none take none because then you get a big check you know in April you get a check in April and they were right I took no deductions on my salary and got a check for one eight hundred dollars which was oh my God it was a it was a fortune yeah that was a lot of money um uh the the other thing that happened uh what happened there was you you end up trying to do anything at all in order just to perform not get paid just to perform and you need some brand of professional representation and I did uh I did a uh I was lucky enough to be in a uh uh Workshop sort of production that was a fledgling uh Shakespeare company was trying to develop its rep and its uh cred and I was in a I did a production of uh this sort of comedio Del Arte once again I was the loudest guy on the stage they needed somebody to avoid volume and uh and energy and uh one of the actresses and I said hey I know a guy who's a who's a manager and I told him NCO you can go meet him so I ended up going off and meeting a a classic kind of like Showbiz manager so you think you got you what do you want kid huh they said oh that right well let me tell you what the secret of all of this is potential potential that's the secret of this business and you got potential so this very old school manager ended up sending me around to some agencies and what agencies that would never have had me in were it not for that a phone call from somebody like like my manager and uh that ended up being part of a go see audition cattle call that the American Broadcasting Company was running this happened very fast I can't I can't tell you the speed with which this happened it was like lightning I did go back to Cleveland for my third season there but I left I even left that early in order to in order to go back and hit what they called pilot season yeah which I didn't know anything about but but I walked into Joy the ABC had a lot of you know they had a lot of money back then it was you know there were three networks and they were all viciously competing and there was a what it was is the American Broadcasting Company said we are going to start we're going to work with the legendary Joyce Selznick casting the Joyce Selznick who is connected to those salesnicks by the family name she was a legendary casting person in Los Angeles which meant nothing to me because La was where you went to go to you went to Disneyland in L.A that's all that's the only reason he went to right away um and they were they were having this famous it was a talent search for Talent Development deals that they were going to sign people to I didn't know this I found this out later and they were going to take these people and stick them in all of their new series and lo and behold there was a class of us I know and Jillian was one and she was put in it's a living and John James was one and he was put in Dynasty or something like that one of these and I kept uh I kept getting through these four-minute audition things by being the loudest guy in the room you know and did you know what it was for I had no idea I had no idea it was just audition and and read these lines or deliver something that was kind of like uh tell us a little bit about yourself and read this copy and uh thanks for coming in and oh by the way can you come back next Tuesday and we'll do a little bit more they were people they were surrounded by piles of resumes and take out food they were just seeing when I say cattle call they were seeing eight million people and I had been on other Cattle Calls I had been on things for TV commercials and like National Lampoon uh various things we just they called Equity principal interviews where they sort of have to have these meetings and they see 400 people people in the course of the day and it's all thank you and thanks very much but for some reason lo and behold I don't I don't know why they kept inviting me back until they said we're going to send you to Los Angeles as sort of like a quasi uh audition kind of pretz to see how I would do um uh in the the true meat grinder which is go read for a specific pilot with specific producers and what have you and I know there was at the time um they were they were trying to develop such things as the TV version of breaking away a television show that was originally it was called at first it was called Jack Flash and later on they called it into the the last American hero they're all these sitcoms that they were doing some which which went and some didn't and um next I they say you're going to go to were you going to go to La we're going to fly out to the the coast we're gonna fly out to the gonna fly out to the coast and I had I didn't have a credit card and I had no money and I had could I didn't even know how I was going to get around and they gave me these vouchers for taxi cabs in Los Angeles and it was surreal and I would go out and I would do what they said I'd be in some hotel for for three days and then they would then I would go back um and they'd said oh you shouldn't have gone back we have a few more things I kept going backward then lo and behold found out that they had signed me to this um Talent deal um I was I was part of the class I didn't even know I'm just it's just sort of remarkable to kind of get your head around this because you are a total unknown at this point like you are a nobody no one knows you there's an open cattle call and you are auditioning for the show that would become of course Bosom Buddies and you came from the the Shakespeare like you were a Shakespearean actor like that's what you had been doing for the previous three seasons and it's almost like you were back in your apartment in Alameda horsing around with your brothers and sisters like that was the character yeah that's exactly yeah yeah that was it that's that's uh right there is something to do uh look the the experience of doing Shakespeare with with uh trained professional actors um uh is you know if you got to go out on stage and make sense of saying the Duke does greet you General and requires your haste post taste appearance even on the instant if you've got to make that thing sing uh uh that's great training in order to walk into a room and say what's the intent of what this character is and oh I see on one hand it's very funny but at the other hand you've got to be a real guy yeah to in in the in the theme of the job I did not get I had been out and and was auditioning for everything that they wanted me to audition for and you get called into the network in which you're sitting you're sitting in the waiting room honestly with 27 other actors and they're literally figuring out who's going to be in what and who's going to be sent home and I auditioned for Bob Miller and uh Tom Miller and Bob Boyette Miller milkerson Boyette Productions the creative force behind Happy Days in Laverne Shirley and Morgan Mandy and a ton of other things and they had a show that they were gonna it was the TV version of Foul Play the movie Foul Play yeah and I went in and read for the TV version of Foul Play great movie and they said that the that was great you go over can yeah can you go can you go sit in that office right there and we'll come talk to you in a second and I said okay so I sat at some guy's desk and at ABC uh in Century City and Bob Bob Boyette came in and uh he said well we don't want you for Foul Play I said okay I said we want you to do Bosom Buddies which I had auditioned for I said okay yeah and that that was that and that was that I was watching um I went down to Bosom Buddies Rabbit Hole oh man the other day how do you even find it are they on YouTube you find it okay all right you can find it and I remember watching it as a kid and what's remarkable is that um it's a physical role like you're a physical comedian it's almost like they're like you see elements of like Kramer from Seinfeld or Chandler from friends that would happen you know decades later there was a real it was you weren't just like this kind of you know fun-loving guy like you were it was a physical role and there's a scene I I remember watching where you're with your with Peter Scolari the other Peter scalari yeah somebody and he and you dare him to slap you and then he slaps you and you see do that again he keeps slapping you you're just standing there while he's slapping you and then there's you sort of are kind of wrestling with him and um I mean that was a what was it I remember yeah I did I mean that and and I wonder how you I mean did that kind of acting come more naturally to you because of where you came from and how you grew up versus the kind of acting that you had been trained to do for the previous five or six years I think that I had been cast an awful lot as that guy who did very physical stuff uh and when I played grumio uh in Taming of the Shrew I was all over the place I was flopping left and right I was getting beat up I was getting smacked I was being dragged by an imaginary horse on stage the physicality of It kind of went into being The Shakespearean clown uh but it was I mean I was that would still just me goofing around in the living room in a pair of socks seeing how far you could slide before you ran into the glass door you know the sliding glass door uh and Peter and I I can't I can't stress enough the bond that Peter and I developed in the course of doing that it's clear it's clear we were we spoke a secret language Peter and I did because we were the only two guys on the show that was one thing and uh we were you know we were in in every scene together and um he he had this tight gymnast body he was I mean he had the lowest center of gravity and had absolutely it was all muscle mass and he had this intense he wanted to be um uh uh he wanted to be Buster Keaton and he had this great Stone Face and his physicality oh that's we were always working out I remember there was one thing where he threw he threw our portable uh KIPP at Henry's portable um TV at me uh you know he says oh you think this is yours and so he threw it at me and the joke was going to be that it was going to smash on the floor and then we'd get on with the rest of the scene and what we did was it had a little handle on it so um uh I said hey can you throw that at me like so maybe I could get that I could grab the handle in midair and so we worked on it right it wasn't in the script and when we did it for the writers at the read through they like stood up and applauded because we worked it out so that Peter through he was a juggler and so he had great spatial uh you know dexterity so he threw it at me so that the handle was right up and I could reach over and grab the handle and then just like I caught it in in midair and then he he threw in this kind of look it's like hey and I I threw in this look of like hey and it became a different beat and we time took on it that that was our job to find these little crap acts and all these scenes that the writers wrote and just developed this other kind of stuff in the physicality of it was we were extremely young and you know I have attention deficit disorder probably it was always too too caffeinated but we were just trying to take it and like bulk up comedic scenes so they wouldn't just us be standing there saying five six seven eight and I can't we became extremely extremely uh tight almost almost too tight for some people on the show I know that um and I know that you were very very close with him and obviously he's he's no longer alive but um the two of you went on to collaborate a few times and were on the stage together I I'm curious about your personal life I mean you were living on unemployment like six months before that you were getting no work in New York City you had uh children you were I mean you were unknown and you're now on a national network television show that at that time was watched by tens of millions of people presumably it was always well it was always in third place you know we did we the we bemoan the fact that um Tom Selleck was on CBS in Magnum PI and we were on ABC on Bosom Buddies so we were kind of toast but it's funny you should say that because yes we were number three for the night but number three for the night still had 13 million people watching 13 million people I mean today that would be the biggest oh it'd be huge yeah how did that I mean that must have just kind of rocked your world I mean you were all of a sudden famous like not really I would say no no you wouldn't no I I that I was I was a celebrity uh in a way that the only way it could sort of translate like that was like so is that I'd be at baggage claim yeah and somebody would say hey are you that guy from Bosom Buddies so the show was only on the air for two years um that's but you were making money for the first time in your life uh yes yeah I was making money just barely staying with water because the cost of living in Los Angeles and having a car and they did they didn't they they didn't apply us with a ton of money I mean um when you think of between well this is 1980 and I got paid five thousand dollars per episode but half of that goes to taxes and you lose some other two commissions and so I was kind of like look I had enough money to make house payments but only for a year and uh I had by the time the show is over um my daughter was my daughter Elizabeth was born so you had two kids and a house in the valley and you know waiting for the phone to ring and whatever nut that you were able to put put away was you know it was quite quite dwindling that the thing that happens after your Show is canceled is that you're on a show that's been canceled yeah so there is on one hand there's an onus as in kid You Had Your Shot and it didn't pan out yeah but the other thing is uh the other thing that can happen is well this this he was pretty good on that show so uh other people other you know some other interests would come around to it but it's not like oh gosh can we get that guy it was just like he might work out so there was a yeah there were a couple of years there where uh to be on to be an unemployed actor middle class unemployed actor with a dwindling bank account and car payments and two kids uh and be waiting for the phone to ring that that was that's that's not the that's not the greatest way to go to bed every night at 11 o'clock but it also didn't I have to say again uh it it did not have it did not last for a very long time I gotta say lightning quick I ended up meeting the guys who wrote Splash who said hey that guy that was in that guest episode of Happy Days he might be good and Ron Howard is just starting out and this as a director as a director and you met Ron Howard for the first time as a guest actor no no he was already gone what I well I met there he was gone I met the writers from uh this is I met drill Logan they had they had written uh they were getting into writing features and I was just coming in I thought to read for the funny brother because uh those were the roles that I was reading for funny Brothers kooky sidekick the guy with energy you know the loudest guy in the room and this and by the way they they asked you to reach for this based on that one guest appearance you did on Happy Days yeah yeah you were like you were like the fonz's cousin or something oh I was a guy that was mad because he he kicked me off his swing when I was young and I came I came back for you know and simply because of that one guest appearance they thought hey you know this guy's interesting well I think they were aware of Bosom Buddies but it just that was just another TV show but yeah right yeah yeah and that the thing is the movie Splash was a low budget movie for Disney and old Disney you know I mean Roy Disney was still running it and uh Ron Ron and Brian I can't I got to get Brian Grazer you know that Brian Gray they're now run imagine entertaining colleagues yeah they're collaborators yeah and they were young Turks that were trying to make their trying to make their way and on one hand it's the deal in order to get the movie done in the first place so then how do you get the movie done and uh going into it um the studio essentially didn't care after everybody turned it down after every A-list movie star from Chevy Chase to Dudley Moore to Warren Bay I mean everybody just said they weren't interested nobody wanted to be in Splash no one wants to be in Splash directed by Opie Cunningham for Walt Disney no one no one wants to do that but uh was she was she a big star at that point that was the deal the studio wanted Daryl Hannah because she had she had been and she had late been in Blade Runner right uh she had been there she was actually she was Daryl Hannah yeah and uh they didn't care about anybody they didn't care about anybody else so they didn't care who's gonna it was like Alan Bauer I think was your character they didn't care who was going to play no no they were they were willing to let uh Ron and Brian decide that so wow uh and in fact um I went in and read I just met them and I thought these are the first guys who are my peers usually I go in these meetings and there's people that are 20 years older than me you know and they have the posters of their old movies up on the walls you know right These Guys these guys had pictures of Old Yeller you know and you know old Dumbo movies you know that they weren't even their movies and uh Ron said okay I want you to come in I want you to read but I don't want you to read for the brother I want you to read for um uh Alan and I said oh oh okay all right and and Ron said you know that's the lead I said okay meaning is like you know take this seriously I mean come in come in I'm giving you the he didn't say so much but he was saying I'm giving you the opportunity to win the job so come in and and read for it wow and uh I did and I you know I worked hard and well you know I prepared uh and he taped it back in the rudimentary home video taping system you know on a thing and he ran me through some exercises and I had to you know change change pace and I had to do it but then that was that and he called me up a couple of days later and he said hey hi yeah it's Ron uh Hey listen um uh you got the job but I need a favor okay can you go back to that first thing you said you know yeah they're done okay yo no you got the job it's gonna be great you're perfect but I need a favor uh and I said something to the point yes Mr Howard what can I do for you and he said um the studio is uh the studio is finding me on Daryl Hannah he really wanted Daryl Hannah yeah and and the studio said well fine but how good is she and what does she look like so Ron said I need you to come in and do a on camera test that is not going to be your test it's going to be for Daryl because she's great right yeah and we've come you'll be since compared notes about that you know Daryl and I had some sort of odd reunion with somebody not too long ago during the good during the coveted break we talked about this and her side of it of course was you know fascinating and I said okay all right I don't know what a real can and he said this I mean like on videos I don't know this would be a real camera test I didn't I didn't know what that was I mean it was lights and 35 millimeter and a camera Dolly and push-ins and push-outs in the scene the whole bit and um when uh when he said okay yeah sure I'll come in and do it uh but is uh when on the day of the test I said Hey Ron is there any chance at all that I blow my job in this camera test I mean is it I said no we're not we're just going to see the back your head we won't even get a sense of who you who you are in it I just want to see you guys on camera at the same time and uh you know the rest is some brand of cinematic history we we yeah ended up making the movie and nobody cared about it very much but the movie was very good and it established it certainly established Ron and and Brian it was sort of like the uh I think it was actually the first Touchstone movie Disney was trying to develop another division of its movie so it wouldn't always be Walt Disney presents Gus the mule kicking of course it was Touchstone films I recently um had had a chance to spend a bit of time with Ron Howard and he's just an incredibly lovely human being I mean just remarkably kind person I shouldn't say remarkably he just really is especially given that he really kind of grew up in is in it for all the right reasons he's he does this because he just loved it and he figured out that he loved it when he was literally Opie you know as he was growing up on that show he just said this is what I want to do for the rest of my life but I want to direct and there you have it this sort of begins a sort of this period of well a collaboration that you would go on to continue with Ron Howard collaborations you would have with Robert zemeckis with Nora Ephron with Steven Spielberg when I say collaborations I mean literally like like getting into the script with these directors working on changing the character investing in movies that weren't fully funded how let's talk about Ron Howard for a moment you know because you would go on to make many films with him how did that collaborative relationship begin because sometimes it can be heavy-handed right where the star is saying I want to do it this way but but from everything I've read about the way you've collaborated with all these different directors it was really a collaboration it was like let's sit down and have fun and so what do you remember about Ron Howard like when you were on Splash when you were in Splash you were not a powerful Hollywood actor but but did you were you able to change that character or were you able to put your stamp on that film in a way that felt right to you I have this is all about what the collaborative process are and there's some people that realize that they they come drawn would come with the bare bones and have faith that somebody is going to add spice to the stew um yeah yeah uh and you know look there's there's plenty of it here's the shot here's bang bang this is what we're doing like that but Ron started off of saying you know what else anything else we can bring to this and that um was on one hand sort of in tune with um I'll go back to groomio in Taming of the Shrew because it's just lines unless you add stuff to it you know how about if we try this what if what if this means that um and I I didn't realize for a while that that's what directors like Ron and Bob and Steve Stephen and Nora um uh want from the reason they're casting you in the first place they want you to have some idea that is in tune with what the text wants and yet can only be provided by whoever is playing the role there was uh uh the the and Roger so what do you think of this you know what do you mean what do you think what do you make of this you know and I was so I would be so dumb I'd have all sorts of like ideas because I did not know how movies were made and Ron would point out well we can't do that because that's a whole other shot he's literally saying what can we do here what can we do in this scene that is covering this bit and I remember there was there was one they had built a they had built a stage that was the uh in the apartment building that Alan lived and there were elevators on both sides of the hallway and there was a button for both both elevators and um I didn't know why only one elevator worked you know because it was a set so I I'd say they said well look I'm in a real hurry because I'm trying to find her she's left the apartment I gotta go find her out there somewhere and I'm a real hurry so what if I come out and he says okay all right so you know come out and press the button and wait for the elevator I said well that's exciting okay so but because there were two buttons I ran out and I said how about this and I ran out and I pushed one button and I ran on the other side of the hallway and I pressed the other button and I just stood in the middle like I was waiting which elevator is going to come and then as soon as the elevator started opening I ran into that elevator and Ron said uh yeah let's do that but we're going to have to push a camera back so we can see so that's the type of thing that collaborative directors are going to want and um without knowing that that is kind of like look that's that's what you know that's what Victor Fleming did on Gone With the Wind and that's what you know uh uh uh uh who directed Casablanca you know that that's what every Buddy says the good directors come in and said what do you make of this here you know what what what can we do here and they don't always do it you know but there are plenty of times when they say yeah let's try that the danger here is that you for an actor you have to accept no yeah uh hey how about if we try this ah that ain't it let's try something else uh and that is the collaborative process that if you're not oh look I'll tell you I'll tell you right now guy Roz the reason why all these people like working at with me I think is because I show up on time yeah I'm not late yeah I get there and you're ready I get there ready you know um Dan Sullivan Dan Sullivan at the Great Lake Shakespeare Festival yelled at us one day when we were rehearsing uh Taming of the Shrew because Hamlet had opened the night before and the principal cast was all kind of hung over and we were late and we were retired and it was hot and he got mad at us because hey man you people don't have any energy don't you understand you got to show up you got to be here on time you got got to know the texture and you got to have an idea right because I can't do this all myself and I just thought the the the value of having an idea you know if it works it works if it doesn't it doesn't but that means you're coming in with some brand of forward momentum yeah uh something that is going to do add something to it and it's you know I have to say I I know I've worked with a lot of people that say hey what do you what do you make of this right here and uh yeah that's the sauce Tom I'm I'm curious I was just thinking about all the films you've been in obviously we won't we can't talk about most of them but I it's pretty remarkable because I think I I mean I've seen most of the films you've been in almost all of them and just just you just do and I think a lot of people can say that and I think about the characters in the films you've been in you know we've played Mr Rogers and Ben Bradley and Colonel Tom Parker and Forrest Gump and um Andrew Peck in Philadelphia I go on I mean Walt Disney Charlie Wilson and what's remarkable about the the you're sort of the Arc of your careers you've made so many films and very few of them have bombed you know and I and I wonder how you I mean there have been a few but very few given the number you've made yeah I mean that you know it's like anybody who plays pro ball loses games you know yeah yeah but I wonder how how you have I mean it seems like that you I mean your judgment for the scripts you choose the roles you play is obviously very good and I wonder how you how you make those decisions like for example Forrest Gump you know somebody could have read that script just on paper and thought Oh this is weird or this is kind of schlocky or Pastiche or whatever and you saw that film and you thought this is going to be an incredibly successful this is going to be a mega like well I don't know maybe that's not what you thought but you're you're probably you're giving me more credit look without a doubt I was attracted to it for a very specific purpose because um uh I I just really that for I I I I deemed relatively quickly that my my my version of forest was could he could only operate at the speed of his own common sense that's it he there was no he had no knowledge Beyond yeah what mama and Jenny told him and what and what yeah and and that was it but that's not just that's just not the guy who plays Forrest Gump Bob zamakis and Eric Roth who wrote the screenplay Gary Sinise uh Michael T Williamson and um and Sally Sally Peninsula and Robin Wright we all sat we all sat together for weeks with Bob and Bob was saying well what do we make of that we start at the beginning of the script and we all talked about everything even scenes we're not in and what it meant to the text that was like you must know the text that doesn't mean your own lines you must know the text because the text is the interpretation of the theme and the theme is why you're all there in the first place if I was going to say hey look I I don't know how to I don't know how to you know communicate instincts uh but it's the the thing that will always land the question I ask myself is is the theme of this movie worthy of the time and effort and examination of it to draw people into it become involved and uh a movie like that because it was all about oh my Lord there's so many there were so many lessons to uh to learn from that uh from that but it would not have happened without the boss oh you know what I'm gonna have to can we take a moment I have to go get my power outlet to plug into my laptop please all right yes uh let's all let's all take it let's all enjoy a seven minute break while I go up and find my find my power Inlet I'll be right back thank you all right boom success you're gonna be okay so we were talking about about that that film and and that sort of preparing for that role and I wonder if I can ask you just to I'm curious if you could break down how you become a character and obviously there are too many you know you whether it's Ben Bradley or Captain Phillips or whatever but let's talk about a a recent character a character of yours Tom Parker because he was different than a lot of characters you played in the sense that he was he was not um a a nice guy right I mean he was not an easy person to like there's certainly elements about him that are some we are sympathetic towards um and he's complex but I couldn't help but walking away from that film feeling like he he really screwed over Elvis that he really kind of ruined his life I mean Force kind of forcing him to perform in Las Vegas for seven years in a row but aside from that just let before we talk about you know the complexity of who he was there's a lot to there's a lot to unpack there yeah help me understand how you become that character you so baslerman says I want you as Tom Parker this is a guy who is like Dutch but he kind of hid that he pretended like he was sort of a southern honorary Colonel all these weird things he didn't he hit his past how how did you is sort of build the architecture for me about how Tom Hanks then transforms into this character that becomes convincing I was very lucky because I had no idea what Tom Colonel Tom Parker looked like I had no idea what he sounded like I had the same sense that oh Colonel Tom Parker he must have been a Foghorn Leghorn kind of guy well let me tell you here son I'm not going to tell you what's going to do right now um and I had heard stories uh from my old my makeup man Danny streepek who did Elvis for four movies including um Viva Las Vegas and I the first thing I ever heard about Colonel Thompson oh he was just a low-class Carney that's all he was he'd teach out of a quarter you know that kind of thing um because that's what I heard but I did not know what he looked like and when I did see what it looked like I asked baslerman why do you want me that this is this is a heavyset balding man with you know a hawk like nose with this weird accent that no one can actually place and so my question was okay boss let's collaborate what are you going for here are you going for the physical look and he said oh oh yes yes yeah so we're talking about a substantial amount of of Prosthetics in order to make me look like Colonel Tom Parker he says oh yes yes yes yes I said okay now I had just played um uh Falstaff in a production of Henry IV here in Los Angeles because the other thing is okay so um that's what you're going for as far as look and I'm going to assume the same thing is in goes going to voice because I have I've received you know commands from directors oh you're going to do a dialect that's okay all right very good very I uh Stephen on uh on Catch Me If You Can he says I went I went I want Carl Han ready to be from Boston I said okay all right that's a tough tough one to get but I started today okay so then after that it's like and why are you Mr baslerman what are you trying to crack here with an examination of the Elvis story because the myth has been done to death right the myth has been has become accepted as the truth and he says exactly um as far as Colonel Tom Parker is concerned he said without a doubt there would have been no Elvis Presley without Colonel Tom Parker no right that's clear without a doubt yeah the other side of it is there would have been no Colonel Tom Parker without Elvis Presley and I said okay now you're talking about the ego of a man now you're talking about a man who wants to who is in this for two things the power of running the show and the Delight of screwing the Rubes that's what we discovered he was a Carney meaning that the carnival comes to the small town on the uh out in the outskirts you put up the lights you put up the Ferris wheels you put up the tents those people are going to come they cannot help themselves and your job is to give them the greatest night of their lives one thrill after another one amazing moment after another one Delight after another and also take them for every dime you can and that twin Delight is what comes at Colonel Tom Parker's favorite movie was Nightmare alley he loved the old um uh uh uh who was it who was it that starred in uh nightmare alley Tyrone Powers nightmare around me that was just most recently remade by uh uh uh Guillermo del Toro he loved it because that was how they took the Rubes for the in the saying you they that for 25 cents they provided you with a nickels worth of entertainment all right so you start studying that around and there's a ton of stuff about the background yeah he was from Holland uh he got into the Carney business as a very young man over there his desire was to run Barnum and Bailey's uh Big Top circus that's what that's what his dream he jumped ship once and stayed and then went back and then when he came back again probably for scarless reasons uh you know not just dodging his pass but perhaps the law no one knows for sure um and then adopting a whole you know he called himself Tom Parker and then one day he was awarded an honorary Colonel made an honorary Kentucky Colonel by you know the mayor of uh you know Knoxville Tennessee or something like that or come someplace in Kentucky and um and so then he adopted Colonel Tom Parker that's how we and he still had that crazy you know the odd voice but you know now here's where here's where it ends up going south my uh Rita knows Priscilla Presley from women's cancers organizations and they happen to run into each other in a restaurant here in L.A Rita oh hey Priscilla oh Todd we're so excited that uh you know Tom's going to be doing the baz movie about my husband you know yeah well yeah uh would you like to come up could come up and we'll have dinner we'll talk about it um wow and so not only did Priscilla come up but Jerry Schilling who was a member of the original Memphis Mafia who uh knew Elvis from high school touch football games you know back in Memphis they came up and I said you know we were just beginning the process and I said oh well please give me a great horror story about Colonel Tom Parker yeah and they looked at me and they said we don't have any horror stories about Colonel Tom Parker huh and I said yeah look you don't have to be nice you know don't worry about is it no Colonel Tom Parker was a lovely man who was a who was a delight to be around who showed nothing but the greatest respect for my husband and my husband would not be would not have become what he did without Colonel Thompson Colonel I wish they Jerry Schilling said I wish he was still alive today because so I could talk to him on the phone once a week wow he took he took care of Priscilla Presley long after the divorce he called her every Sunday said how are you doing how's that how's your daughter is there anything I can do for you if there's anything that I need now she also said look he was a car need and we had to sue him for the money that he owed us but you know that's because he was not my husband's manager he was my husband's promoter and they both of them both Jerry and Priscilla described Elvis in a term that I think you would probably use for a great artist like Picasso or maybe Eugene O'Neill or some reason they said my you have to understand the only thing that mattered to my husband was music performing music at three o'clock in the morning if he wasn't in bed he would be downstairs playing gospel on the piano in the living room he loved that's what he wanted to do he could not say yes or no he said yes sir of course yeah um he took he took guidance and you if you take this reality there's a there's this old story it's not in the movie unfortunately I wish it was in which the colonel said to uh to Elvis son right now you have a million dollars worth of talent when I'm done with you you'll have a million dollars and that's true uh from from the signing with Colonel Tom Parker in which he was essentially making a living by performing on the you know around in small clubs and selling records out of the uh the the the trunk of Sam Phillips's car yeah uh he went from that to moving into the Graceland Mansion which he bought cash you know within 18 months so that's what Colonel Tom Parker did for Elvis uh The Genius of Colonel Tom Parker cannot be overstated but it is all washed away I think from the great legacy of the late 60s and 70s in which the colonel was wrong I'm not going to say I'm not he was look he was not there was no he never advised Elvis yeah he never said I think you should do music like this I think you should perform like this what he was is very possessive he wasn't about to you know let go of his the great elephant attraction that he had that's another long story I can tell about him yeah if you want to be the richest guy in the carnival own an elephant because everybody pays 25 cents to see the elephant and they'll also pay another 10 cents for two cents worth of peanuts in order to feed the elephant and that's what it was um but when Elvis wanted to make movies it was a very good sir I'll make I'll get a deal and you'll make movies and um uh if you wonder if you want to make some more records I'll get a deal with you and make some more records if you want to go on a big national tour I'll make sure that you can go on a big natural if what you want is what you do what what happened was is that both Jerry and Priscilla told me that he was respectful he called him Mr Presley they had a very quiet tight Bond what got in the way uh which gets in the way of almost every business relationship is time and money yeah um I don't think I'm telling Tales out of school that said Elvis came back from the Army in the early 1960s with a pension for um uppers you know amphetamines that sold across the counter there and everybody in the Army used them in order to stay awake for uh uh uh Maneuvers and what have you and he kept that kept up and uh then along with it came you know you have to be able to relax so then there became that yin and yang of you know taking something that made you feel good to taking something that made you go to sleep very Terry well now we we don't Elvis you could probably look at the history of drug abuse in the 1960s and Elvis would make just as much sense as anybody who is was famously a heroin addict you know Keith Richards and Elvis Presley they were essentially you know looking for the same sort of Escape that you're going to get from some degree of Narcotics um the the the the the the the evil of Colonel Tom Parker I think you're going to say that he signed that deal in Las Vegas on one hand was a brilliant deal because none of those shows cost Elvis Presley a dime yeah the student the the casinos paid for absolutely everything but what was wrong about it the the colonel got all of his gambling debts erased and he got Elvis five million dollars a year when he could have asked for 35 million dollars a year but there was no such things as 35 million dollars a year so at the end of the day you have to say what did Colonel Tom Parker do for Elvis um he made all of his dreams come true at the same time he turned him I think into the elephant um chained up inside a tent that people paid 25 cents to see I'm I'm sort of like just that's the story I didn't really talk about the character I mean that's that's the logic of what of what has to come out in the characters so when I'm talking about you have to understand I have to understand the logic of why these people do what they did Colonel Tom Parker ran Elvis's career in a very specific kind of way why his place he knew he had Picasa and in order to make Picasso more valuable you have to make him less accessible and so he took him off of TV if you wanted to see Elvis Presley there was only one way to do it you you wouldn't see him on the Steve Allen Show after that one thing you wouldn't see him on tonight's show you had to buy a ticket you had to buy a record or you had to listen to pay radio in which uh in which they made money off of every time limit play I wonder though I mean your portrayal of Tom Parker I mean I'm sort of kind of gobsmacked that Priscilla Presley you know was saying those those things about him because I while your portrayal was certainly sympathetic and you walk away understanding that he was responsible for Elvis's stardom you also walk or at least I walked away from your portrayal thinking that there are sociopathic tendencies in him that he's a man who lacked empathy he was yeah uh I think that's where you get into the aspect of um who's got the power here I do you know because you want my boy and if you want my boy you're going to have to give me exactly what I want that's just the way it works yeah um that I think the tragedy that hurt both of them was the Colonel's lack of imagination because 1968 Colonel Tom Parker's philosophy was you never bring politics to the carnival we don't go there we don't talk about that stuff and what he was did not understand was the great power that Elvis had because if Elvis had come out and just spoke lovingly about the state of you know Vietnam and the everything that was going on he made he he pounded into Elvis that no you're just an Entertainer you're just an Entertainer you're just an Entertainer we must entertain if you want to go into politics run for office and I'm not your manager anymore and that was a mistake he he did not understand the great cultural place that Elvis had because Elvis wanted you know Elvis was hip when it came down to all this stuff Elvis's uh Elvis's uh influences were you know rhythm and blues black artists all and he he gave jobs to all sorts of people of color uh in places where um uh they would not have been able to have the opportunity weren't not Elvis Presley say no I want I want them in the band I want them as my background singers I want them in the show uh and that's the uh that's where you get into the the uh I think the easy way of saying saying that well you know the the colonel gave Elvis Presley a a career but he sort of ruined his life yeah but even from even from Priscilla it's like um uh Elvis did not have a business bone in his body but he could have said no he could have said he could have said no do you know do you know what she thought of of the film in your your portrayal well um I will tell you this that there isn't anybody that portrays Elvis without going through some part of their um uh the right of the family the estate and they've been burned many many many many many many many times because uh the myth of Elvis is the thing that carries the day I don't want to put words in their mouth but they were they were they were very pleased and I think rightly so because I I think the great power of baza's movie is it gets fascinating after the 1968 Comeback Special because that's that's where the almost like Greek tragedy starts kicking in and the way it the fact that it and the the myth is Elvis got fat he did a lot of drugs he gave lousy shows and he shot a TV you know that's pretty much it he went nuts in a in a Las Vegas hotel room yeah and he did do really bad shows and he did get adult and he did he did uh um he was that yeah I did shoot a team TV and you know he was he was he was uh he was affected by drugs but the uh that lat you know there is that we have that it's in the movie that last content that that voice never left and that power never left even though he was bloated and he was tired and uh it would have and I think that they were just happy uh I don't want to speak for them I think they were just happy that their uh uh her husband and Lisa Marie's father was portrayed as an artist that struggled yeah and so as opposed to you know uh an example of sloth or greed or avarice right right I I want I'm curious about all the rule and by the way um we're over time here so we're supposed to stop we just talked about movies guy I do that are you okay yeah I'm fine I really appreciate it um I I wonder with all the the rules you played right um Ben Bradley and and Mr Rogers and Jim Lovett and Apollo 13 and I think it's John Miller and Saving Private Ryan oh yeah he's not a real guy he was a he was yeah but all the characters he played Walt Disney and and Charlie Wilson um who do you this might be two different questions so but let me ask it in one question who do you most identify with like who do you who do you think is are you are most like or maybe they're different maybe they're different questions I I'm not like any of these guys uh because I I don't I don't have the wherewithal or the stick-to-itiveness but that there I would say there's there's a number of there's a number of things that I that I reacted to immediately Charlie Wilson look he he wanted to kill Russians that's it he wanted to take him on head to head hey they're the bad guys and we've lost to him every time let's go get it I get that hey let's take a shot let's see what we can do I know this game it's all the game man I know how to play the game let's play the game let's take out some of them ruskies at the same time um the I get that uh I will say that uh the pressure of uh Chesley sullenberger Sully uh his sense of responsibility as a professional pilot and what he went through on uh on uh both the the uh the the the Miracle on the Hudson and then also the yeah uh the hearing after yeah for the national Transportation safety board and I I when he walked me through that I I thought this is this is this is bone cracking pressure that this guy had underneath it yeah but not just in the moment just as like flying a plane load of 500 strangers from LaGuardia to Charlotte is a miracle if you accomplish it without anybody anybody you know uh being hurt every single day and uh there there is I've always uh I've gotten something and or learned something uh powerful um uh that and that's part of the the reason why uh uh the throwing into the early process of learning about who these people are or forming the logic of who they are because not everybody is a real person you can get into a difficulty that's that's when you get into um the collaborative process where uh I start saying let's not make this up guys you know you put why is it you know there is there is some stuff that goes into movies and I say it's not it's not black and white like that it's like for example uh on uh on Captain Phillips uh you know I talked to Rich Phillips and he walked me through the the entire process and again bone cracking uh pressure not just when he was uh hostage kidnapped by those Somali pirates but also just to keep that ship going I mean there's three unions and you're always Under Pressure uh from the from the shipping company and you've got to make all these very specific things and it's just one damn thing after another while you're at Sea um then on top of that you get you get kidnapped by Pirates um and walking through all of that part of it is just like I can't imagine going through that but the other part of it is is like tell me about that again because I think that's something I can touch on briefly uh uh in there um and I none of them are like me because at the end of the day I'm just a guy I'm a guy in high school saying this is a class I can take you know I'm looking for I I'm looking for the for the distraction that's going to make life interesting and fun uh and now maybe it's work at the same time but it ain't work to me you know I I mean in this I'm sure you've been asked the version of this question a million times but I wonder like I I imagine that the characters that seem like they're the hardest roles to play probably aren't and the ones that people might think are easier to play or maybe the harder ones like for example you know being Woody just being a voice actor is really hard like I've done that that work it's exhausting because you are physically moving and it takes a lot of energy it's brutal it's the hardest work you do as an actor because you cannot move you do not have a costume yeah yeah and you have to be right on the mic like this if you're over here you're not on mic so you can't move you got to get right down there yeah it's Brew it's tough but I will tell you this it's all exactly the same yeah it is a constant like the speed of light you hit a mark at a at a at a very specific place in time and it works in real time you cannot there's no oddly enough in a uh in a medium that is all artifice there isn't a fake moment in it once the camera is rolling and you actually have to deliver these kind of goods and I've seen look I've been I've worked with I've worked with some of the greatest actors on the planet Earth and when I watch them I see them refreshingly battling the same self-consciousness that I feel every time it's time to start a job you feel it every time every time even at 66. oh every every single time now every time yes yes it never never ever what is that what is that what do you mean by that how does that actually manifest itself is it anxiety is it I will tell you this um I ran into okay this is a great story man because I couldn't believe it when it was happening I was years ago I was in a restaurant in New York and the waiter deep makes you the waiter the Mater D came over excuse me Mr Hanks yes Mr DiMaggio is having dinner in the hotel tonight he wondered if if you might come by and and and so so that you could meet and I said Joe DiMaggio and he said yes yes he's a regular here I said and I leapt up from the table and said take me to him yeah and I sat down and I chatted with Joe DiMaggio yeah from San Francisco I'm from Oakland he knew you're an Oakland boy oh yes you're an Oakland boy and what do you what do you say to Joe DiMaggio I said um you still have the restaurant I've eaten in your restaurant well I don't have it anymore but yes it is demanding I said you lived in the Mission District yes yes I had lived all over but yeah my my most recent I said you suffered there was a bit of earthquake damage oh yeah yeah we had the earthquake down another day yes uh and I said hey where where was um Seals Stadium because he played for the San Francisco Seals yeah and he told me the address and he said you can't imagine how big a deal the Pacific coast League was back in the day because that was the first story in the sports Pages was did the seals beat the Oakland Oaks and were they in Hollywood playing the stars because there was not yet enough radio coverage on the west coast of the Yankees and the Cubs and the Indians and what have you so then I asked about his brothers I said uh you know um did how long did Dom play uh for Dom DiMaggio he said oh he was a hell of a ball player hell of a ball player uh um and he said he might have been the best in the family you know Joe DiMaggio is saying this wow so at you know wrapping it up you know um because he was it he was eating alone by the way he was just in by himself so I said well it's a it's a Mr DiMaggio so please call me Joe can't I said you know uh I've gotten a couple of reviews every now and again and I have to say that um when reviewers say I make it look easy I often think of what they said about you that you made you made playing center field look like it was natural and easy and he said this to me Tom it always looked easy except in here and he held his big hands up over his heart and he said oh it looked easy but it wasn't in here and I thought he is just he has just described what it is for me to stand up and say okay I'm this guy I'm going to fall in love or I'm going to do the thing or I'm going to like be in the spacecraft or any of this it's never easy but the process is an instinctive one and when you can let go of the sin of the self-consciousness of uh of uh of uh the the fallacy of it all uh I made a movie called Road to Perdition with Paul Newman yes okay all right I'm and it's like you know it's like Paul knows like playing catchwood it's like playing catch with Joe DiMaggio you know um right and on the very first day we got together you know we got to know Paul was a magnificent man he was you know he's very novel very funny very you know self-effacing but there we all are in the very first day of shooting was a big Irish wake and so there was probably 60 extras and they're all dancing and playing the piano and doing all this kind of stuff and on the very first day Paul had to get up and give a toast you know as his character you know he had to raise a glass of whiskey and you know say something and uh to say that everybody on the stage was waiting for Paul Newman to deliver his first lines on the first day of a movie and he did it you know and rolling and he said you know you know made a may you be in heaven a half hour before the devil knows you're dead he said something like that and cut and Paul just froze and he looked at us all and he said uh you always feel self-conscious that first day don't you and everybody laughed it's like okay so if even even Paul you know has to fight that that tendency of this is not a natural thing to do yeah and yet if you do it well enough get it looks like it's the easiest thing in the world and it never is you know talking about Joe DiMaggio or any athlete right they they hit their Peak at around 32 maybe if they're lucky 35 right that's it you know if you're a professional basketball player 3132 and and you're in a profession where you can actually get better every time like you you are 66 you've been doing this since you were 22 professionally 23 and do you feel that way do you feel like with every character you take on every role you take on you have the opportunity to get better and that you actually do get better as an actor uh I will the only measurement I have for is by the stuff that I don't pay any attention to anymore uh meaning that when you're uh starting out you think there's you think you have all these responsibilities outside of showing up knowing the text and having an idea you think you've got to like oversee props you think you've got to uh you know keep a keep a a certain sort of Timber going on you think there's a different way in order to concentrate in order to get there you have all these kind of like external things you think you have to fight against this right hey quiet down you know you got to do all the you got to say please don't talk to me you have all these things in order that I used to have in order to protect what I thought was my mojo you know this is the way I work and this is what I have to do yeah and all of that stuff is just slipped by the wayside it's just I don't there's um uh the burden of thinking that there's all the stuff you have to keep track of actually gets in the way of of what I think the real the real task at hand is is was to make sure is to have is to provide the pure motivation for the character that is obvious but is something that's only locked inside your own brain like uh there's an example now it's like a lot of times um uh like the camera crew you know there's a focus puller and there's an operator and there might be somebody else there that you know the guy with the boom if you're if you're on the Sound Stage and they recently everybody started dressing in Black you know so that just so they could kind of blend in but there's still that kind of thing they'll say hey Tom am I in your eye line here and I I guess a guy I don't even see you guys anymore I'm sorry you know you're fine don't worry about it because I don't see you anymore now they're there they're in my eyesight but there is another I just don't worry about it yeah so that at the age of thank you 66 66. um there's just a ton of stuff you know I don't worry about anymore that I don't that doesn't interest the I must say that the what has become even more important however and this is getting harder is knowing the text so cleanly that you don't have to think about it yeah um if I have uh if I have if say you know you're most most scenes and movies aren't going to last much longer than four pages right four pages of give and take dialogue but if you're in one of those scenes like in a Norah Efron movie it's a love dialogue or I will tell you the uh in uh playing Sully with with Clint Eastwood we had some scenes that went on for 17 Pages 11 pages or on being on stage on the in the theater I've seen yeah yeah well the the theater is an interesting thing because you get to start at the beginning of the story every night and so there's a lot of muscle memory that goes into riding that wave but if you're doing a movie you've got a day maybe two in order to nail that bad boy and like in Bridge of spies If part of it is you know getting up in front of the Supreme Court and arguing arguing a case that's a lot of dialogue yeah but it can't just be dialogue it has to be connected ideas in your head the same way like your favorite Bruce Springsteen song that you've been singing since 1986 you have to know it so well right that you can pick it up right in the middle of it and that that is requiring more time that is requiring more I mean I have to type out these things on cards and I got to carry it around with me for a long time I got a Mumble and I got to think and you have to you have to do it so that as the day as the day that you're shooting it comes closer you actually have revved up your your your charges so that when you can come in the first thing you do in the morning is you get together with everybody else in this scene he said guys let's run this let's run this let's run it 15 times how much time do we have oh that's okay we'll be in my trailer running this I do it all the time uh because the mental facilities here uh the wherewithal the the you know the marathon aspect of it is uh I don't know how much time I'm actually going to have to have to give it 100 of the energy now that's uh that's is it is that is a technical thing that I've learned to do well maybe it is but it actually ends up feeding into that which will make me stronger as an actor that yeah I haven't I was not able to do in movies when I was in my 30s or 40s you know we were talking earlier about your this just sort of crazy you know sort of maybe call it luck call it fate moment which led to to to you being picked to to play Kip and Bosom Buddies and you know your your career you know you didn't go to Splash and then nothing in common and and big and and so one could look at your career and say my God you know at what point could Tom Hanks ever have experienced self-doubt and so I I ask you that like because you because somebody could look at that trajectory and just say my God like it's just a string of success you know from one to the next and I I wonder if you ever did have a moment of self-doubt or if you ever do now well you want to talk about just the last 24 hours in a while I'll walk you through moments of of uh yeah of there is there is self-doubt that is pure neuroses and I will say guy Roz I am not a neurotic guy yeah I'm not I don't get up I don't fear death and I don't operate by oh I might embarrass myself I do not have that brand of self-doubt yeah and I will say at all and dare I say I never have all right yeah you're lucky I am I am very lucky I was able to to look upon a you know a a Greyhound bus ride uh you know from Oakland to Red Bluff California as an opportunity to look out the window and daydream you know and come up with stories in my head um so that brand of self-doubt I think I'm very blessed in that uh you can call it some degree of confidence if you want to or you can call it um uh hutzpah Moxie whatever my areas that when I wake up at you know two o'clock in the morning uh and end up looking at myself in the mirror in the bathroom and I wonder what in the world has happened to me I think if I was going to look at the age of 66 I guess you know you'll weigh this stuff after a while if you have four kids and three grandkids you know and all the stuff that goes into it you kind of like Wonder you know how am I scarring these people um uh as I was scarred um but I I I I wrestle uh if I can be you know like prosaic enough I wrestle with authenticity I wrestle with um uh the difference between lying for a living as an actor and lying to myself is a human being uh my my work has to reflect some brand of ethos but it did for my dad you know my dad hated the restaurant business and then when he got out of it he loved what he did at you know he was a commercial fisherman and stuff like that and there's a way in order that what you do for a living really does represent what is important to your life is people that love their jobs you know and sometimes they're plumbers and they love their jobs I love my job and uh that what goes along with that I think is a responsibility to always walk this razor fine line between um between truth and falsehood between you know consistency and uh presence I um I know the the import that I myself put on being in the audience yeah when I'm just sitting watching anything I take I take that contract that I have with the people who I'm watching very very seriously I'm in the audience and my job is to let these people take me there that's why I'm here please show me something I've never seen before even if I even if I've seen this production of Hamlet show me something new in Hamlet they did oh they lived up to their side of the contract and I did too when I'm on the other side of that it's like you you it's a gotta be it's a it's a money back guarantee man you you have you have you got to bring that you've got to bring it on and I look I there's movies I don't watch of my own some of which you've mentioned now is big hits because I see the falsehood in them yeah I see the loss I see that one time oh man I miss that opportunity and it's not because at the moment I chose not to it's because after it was done I realized I didn't go far enough I didn't go to the place that I could have gone and then I asked myself well why was it because I was satisfied with what I had was because I wasn't up enough on the text was it because I didn't have enough of those ideas in my pocket or you know is it because I was late that day and we had to rush the shot and instead of six passes we only got two passes at it that's where the self-doubt Creeps in because um uh a look I'll I'll just I'll just go back to Joe DiMaggio again um the equipment I've used this before acting in a movie requires I think the same equipoise as great uh athletes do and by mean equipoise it means that that permanent State between relaxation and concentration a soccer player has it a hockey player has it they have it in basketball I don't know if somebody running track has it because that's it you know you get starting blocky runs as fast you throw something as far as you can it's not a competition it's a it's an ensemble uh you're you're part of a team and that means if you're in a scene and everybody gets their close-up when it comes around on you you better pull your weight you know you better be there as much as as much as they were and oh that's that's where the that's that's where the night sweats and the Terrors come along so self-doubt I think uh someone said you know I and back in the early days you think what is acting what is performing um and why can some people do it and some people can't and it's because it's the battle against self-consciousness I remember never wanting to wear a hat in anything literally he said I don't want to wear a hat why because I look stupid in hats right and then we made uh The Green Mile with Frank Darabont and we had a loving Ensemble on that we were we were as tight as the 27 Yankees on that on that movie all of us because we'd shot in the same place every day and the uniforms the costumes of the prison guard uniforms were just so friggin badass man and we had this logic that was established that that uh that I really loved when we executed somebody on The Green Mile that meant it was the formal occasion and so we all wore our hats our uniform hats and Frank said ah you know I don't know I don't know if we would we need the hats right there said Frank Frank we got to have the hats we've got to have the hats because when we're running old Sparky and we've done the test and we've got the generators going we know we are going to be killing a man we're going to be executing a man that night you have to give us the guards the the the the the uniform as armor so that we get to it because we don't wear our hats day in and day out we only put those hats on when we're gonna execute somebody and Frank would say yeah I get that I get that but I don't know you're wearing hats indoors yes we're wearing the hats indoors because it's official now and he finally said uh I don't know man I just I think he kind of looks silly in a hat which is something I had said eight million times in my career prior to that and then my defense was well yeah I do because that's what I look like in a hat and we won the argument we wore the hats in in the bit and that kind of that self-consciousness is the is the difference between being able to go there and not go there if you're seeing if you're distracted by something on the stage or if uh you don't have the uh you don't have the text in your head and you're not working on that brand of idea you will be self-conscious about how you look and how you sound and that is the death of acting I wonder if if if you know if you kind of can I just add moments to me can I just put that in I don't it's not carved in stone I should have said to me that is the death of acting to me right I think many people can relate to this idea of like authenticity and also I mean even you know just hearing you talk about roles you can't watch I I've interviewed 25 000 people or interviews I can't listen to because I hear the flaws and the and the questions I didn't ask and and and also you know um you know there's a public Persona a private Persona and often they are the same but there's a heightened version right like I I people who listen to my show probably think that I'm always really nice and positive but sometimes I'm not sometimes I'm negative and angry and my wife calls me an yeah yes that happens on occasion yeah um and so I guess my question to you is is is is is what what why do you do it what what motivates you to go out and and play these characters like Marlon Brando sort of famously and I don't know if this is apocryphal but like he did this to collect a paycheck like he really was like a carpenter he went out he got a job he made the cabinet and yeah yeah and now and and so why do you do it what what what gets you out of bed to go to a set to play that part I will tell you this I actually have an answer to this question I'll go back to Vincent Dowling uh artistic director of The Great Lake Shakespeare Festival the very first rehearsal of that production of the Cherry Orchard at the Sacramento actors theater I think it was what it's called and I'm in I'm there because I did not cat get cast in what the butler saw out at out at Sac State um we were sitting around we were about to read uh I have a read through for the first time and he made a little speech you know an Irish guy you know awfully good with uh off the good with that kind of a bit of a Blarney but also an artificial and he he was talking about why we must be actors you know why we're here why the theater you know and he said we're all we're we're he said something like this he said we're all here because there's nothing else like this you know there are poets and there are artists and there are singers and they're musicians and they do it because it's the only thing they can do but I believe that work in the theater is more fun than fun and I heard that and everything I I'm not kidding you I mean I'm 19 years older however it was I was I said I said that's the way I feel you know in high school doing a play in high school it's not like going to high school it's like doing a play it's like it is more fun than fun I don't I I've never thought look the work is hard I don't want to Discount that but the the uh the essence of that is goes into why did Joe DiMaggio put on that you know put on that San Francisco Seals uniform and go out and play you know double headers in September yeah because there's no life like it there's something that is so Grand even if even if even if you lose the game what you have experienced is all this time invested in equipoise that state between concentration and relaxation that the only other time you might get that I think is when you're babysitting your infant children you know and they're walking around the room and you have to keep an eye on them in case they fall and bonk their head on the edge of the coffee table so you have to be right there but at the same time you're right there just laughing it because you're walking there they they're cracking you up they're better entertainment than TV I don't want to be cheesy about it but there's it is it's just it's more fun than fun and the uh the crackling sense of being alive when something is expected of you and you have to hit those marks Spencer Tracy that's the other great thing you know ah there's nothing acting it's simple to act all you got to do is hit the marks and tell the truth a lot of people can hit the marks not everybody can tell the truth and not everybody can tell the truth without a just a ton of struggle there there was a you're I mean you know this you're often talked about in the same you know in the same senses with you know Spencer Tracy or Jimmy Stewart or you know some of these iconic actors and I recently recently wrote a quote from I think it was George what I know is George Clooney and he was asked you know why why aren't you more public why aren't you on social media or something to that effect and he said you know I think that the role my role as a star is to carry myself with dignity and and not necessarily to open my life up to the world and and when you know the actors we've talked about Paul Newman or Jackie Gleason who you worked with or Spencer Tracy there Marlon Brando there was a sense of mystery about them we didn't know them which I and I don't have very few actors today have right yeah and I I wonder whether you think there's value in in that sense of mystery well I think there is look this is very much a mode very rarely do I have a conversation quite frankly like this one guy about what we do for a living because usually and your average PR blast goes out Simply to remind people why they like you and give people an opportunity to ask the questions that they know what the answers are going to be you know it's like that um the concept of mystery now I think can be wrapped up in also equality as far as countenance goes and meaning that there are actors out there in of any gender that says I have no idea what goes on in that person's mind and I love the fact that we don't know this yeah and some of them are you know some of them are big stars and recognized but you have no idea where they live what they do like for example um I once had a meeting with Robert Redford here in Santa Monica and I I said Bob I've driven past your office 1500 times you have an office I realize I don't know where he lives I don't know where he eats I've never seen him driving a car he's never at a fashion show I haven't seen him I haven't seen them cut away to him at a ball game or anything like that right and so he had a ton of mystery but his countenance was extremely well known yeah I mean Robert Redford carried Robert Redford into every Robert Redford role he ever did right and I think the same is true for a lack of mystery now there's privacy and there's also mystery but you I I think that the the countenance is something that is makes people feel as though um they know your ethos they know your they know your ethics they don't necessarily have to know because look if I'm on yeah if I'm doing a PR Blitz if I'm what I call the you know the celebrity Mule Train I'm performing for everybody who is there sure I'm trying to be genuine I'm not I'm trying to tell the truth just enough without lying you know and I'm certainly making a mistake that I think did I say something so stupid in that interview that I'm going to have to issue an apology that happens about once a week gear up I'm sure if something's coming down then I'll have to say Let me let me walk that back um but the uh the the the fact is the the nature of uh the business the requirements the the commercial aspects of it the corporate aspects of it say oh no no you you you don't get to have you get to have a degree of mystery but you don't you you don't get to disappear you you can make that kind of kind of decision and it might get into the might affect you know the opportunities that you have in order to work at a high level meaning uh big budget motion pictures that can be attractive but also it's like you know remember we talk about this all the time when I was a kid maybe when you were a kid too the only time you saw movie stars outside of the movies they were in were maybe on the Jack Parr show and the TV broadcast of the Academy Awards that's when you saw Elizabeth Taylor standing next to one of the red Graves you know that's where you saw Lawrence Olivier uh walking down on the same red carpet as Rod Steiger you saw them nowhere else nowhere and God knows you see celebrities absolutely everywhere you can't uh there's no unless you unless you're going to go live behind a berm on a you know on a private Farm in Salina Kansas a lovely part of the country Salina Kansas you've got um a new film out a man called Otto and I think you've got a novel your first novel coming out in next spring yes and um and you've already written a book of short stories I mean there's a lot of different things you do you've directed you collect typewriters we won't have time to talk about that in detail but um all those things that you do how do they how do they sort of I mean are all those things kind of requirements for you to to just keep your kind of creative spark alive I mean yes it is absolutely that's absolutely what it is uh I cannot wake up in the morning um uh uh and and not pursue some sort of like thing that's clicking around it's totally different yeah yeah I'm gonna have to put to this is how I blew time on four hour Greyhound bus rides you know um you're by yourself there was no such thing as headphones or movies or anything like that you carry I looked out the window and I daydreamed I looked out the window and saw stories in my head some of it were about me but others were just about uh much much much much bigger canvases and Horizons and the um uh if I was going to say what do I do for a living I am a professional Storyteller that's what I am yeah uh sometimes I control the whole story sometimes I have just a voice in it and I can't imagine um living uh without that brand of uh of uh creativity um you know I just I just read a book by Herman wook I think it's wook not wauk you can uh bow down to Herman I always said woke but it might be not yeah I always I always say the guy who wrote The Kane Mutiny and Winds of War um he kept writing until he was a hundred years old you know he was the Norman Lear of his day he got up every single day and and wrote and I read this book called Don't Stop the carnival that I had never heard of and then I realized that oh my Lord I've I've read in uh I've I've read so much Herman wook that um I probably he probably did this work over the course of 50 years you know from beginning to end and I thought oh I actually kind of get that that's a guy that got up and said what's what's the point of the day if you're not going to turn in a thousand Pages a thousand words you got to get up and do your do your pages and I have to I have to get up and Ponder a story I have to get up and oh I can't help myself I don't watch a lot of TV the kids are out of the house now we don't have a dog uh I don't play golf uh uh I I I I get up and uh I can't help but think about oh you know we're we're we have that thing down at the office I wonder what the latest you know maybe we can add something to it like that it's um uh it's just in the nature and I I'm gonna say that might it might go back to that that um that era when as a kid um no one was telling us what was going on so we just sort of like you know kept ourselves busy you know because there were no explanations coming down so I always had this I said no I'm good I'll keep myself busy I have a my our youngest our youngest son who is actually plays the young Otto in a man called Otto he's a he's a he's actually uh he's got a math he got he's got a degree in mathematics for crying out loud which makes him think this is Truman Truman yeah yeah it's like uh I wanted to say are you a Hanks uh because I don't know any of us are good at math I don't know uh but there was he was very young and I will say this about all my kids because he's he's just the one that that that that verbalized it we were we were traveling and we were at a thing and I said I in the morning I said oh hey we'll we'll do this this afternoon and we didn't get around to it and then I realized it was too late to do it and I said hey buddy I'm I'm sorry man the day got away from us and we weren't able to do that he said oh that's okay I said well you know I just I just don't want you to be bored and he looked at me like I was insane he said Dad I'm never bored and I thought okay all right he is a Hanks after all because I have to say I'm never bored because I always got these I always got these stories and these ideas that are rattling around inside my head sometimes they see the LIE today sometimes they don't what's the what's the most common thing the most common line from any of your films that people quote at you when they see you what do they say to you what's the LIE uh uh I get I get Wilson yelled at me quite a lot uh run for us run that's another one um uh they're they're at Houston we have a problem they yell that at me yeah that kind of this they yell earned this yeah you know from from uh I I'm surprised I haven't heard there's no crying in baseball oh I get that yeah that's that's that's that's that that's quite ongoing brace for impact I get that every now and again but uh you know the countenance I think counts uh comes around it's an anop a lot of yotami you know I get a lot of that and that's just like a you know seen it you know do you like I remember I asked Jimmy Fallon about this because I I've been around him and have seen him interact with people and he loves it and he loves when people come up to in restaurants and talk to him and he really and I'm sure you've seen this with him too and and you are very approachable because of your public Persona and the roles you play and I'm sure people just approach you and just want to talk to you and do you love it or is it sometimes something that you just kind of want to I don't know well I understand it there are some times that it makes all the sense in the world and it's very very easy but you know it's not great when you're having dinner with your family because you know because it really not just approaching me they're approaching the family dinner table and it's not and by and large I I'm gonna say 90 of the time it's kind of fine it's great people say uh you know and it is easy to have a quick interaction with it with you but it goes with the territory and yeah the the alternative is to not be out in public you know not do those things when I I'm in New York City the easiest way to get around in the city is taking the subway yeah how can you take the subway so first everybody's everybody's looking at their phone you know and everybody's involved in their lives and every now and again if someone makes eye contact with me and they just kind of go that kind of like body language that says what are you doing down here and my body language says you know I got an appointment downtown and their eyes kind of say good to see you and my I said ah thank you and that's it that's that's all that that all that goes around the other the other thing happens is when it's you know you're publicizing something and then you know outcome the merchants and there's you got to deal with that because uh everybody wants a piece of you but by and large it's like oh hey how you doing I'm all right how you doing I'm okay good to see you all right all right you know that's uh and you just move it on Down the Line Tom thank you so much for spending uh all this time thank you very much well did we get to the bottom of anything I don't know uh I don't I don't know if that's ever the goal really it's more about exploring the truth yeah right that's true it's more interesting to explore not once you get to the bottom where well then there's nowhere else to go uh but when you're exploring there's always more exploring to do oh there's no answers anyway all uh this too shall pass uh but I liked it because this is just a conversation as opposed to you know we're not uh I mean we there's always what are we doing at the end of the day talking about how we do their our jobs and that's when the best way that's one of the best ways to get to know anybody that's like that's like if we're that's where you find out that a guy who is a plumber really really really really loves his job yeah or uh you know a woman who does you know uh Insurance scans or something like that like like when you go and you talk to somebody you know you're getting you're getting the person who does the the sonogram of your carotid artery and you know you end up having a conversation with him you say like what hey can I ask you a question yeah sure I said you ever come across a thing that makes you say okay whoa because you're you're doing this oh I said oh it happens all the time and then they'll tell us a story about someone came in and what they discovered about someone's carotid artery and how fascinating it is that's that's great stuff and that's just a conversation that's easy to do yep it is all right thanks Guy good talking to you that was my conversation with Tom Hanks we'll link to some of the videos that we mentioned in this interview at our website go to thegreatcreators.com Hanks and we publish show notes for all of our episodes at thegreatcreators.com um for more episodes like this on YouTube please hit the Subscribe button below this video and if you want to uh find out when we post new videos just hit the Bell button and you'll be notified I'm guy Roz you've been watching and listening to the great creators thanks so much see you here next time

Channel: Wondery

Views: 574,065

Keywords: wondery, wondery podcast, wondery podcasts, wondery podcast full episode, wondery great creators, guy raz, guy raz podcasts, great creators podcast, guy raz great creators, guy raz how i built this, guy raz how i built this podcast, guy raz wondery, guy raz wondery podcast, wondery business podcast, guy raz interview, guy raz podcast interview, wondery media, tom hanks interview, tom hanks podcast, tom hanks podcast interview, tom hanks, tom hanks movies, tom hanks elvis

Id: XgOBq6OK3Ng

Length: 119min 44sec (7184 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 11 2023