I was worn down over the next few weeks as I spent hours on the phone with people who knew him well. The things they said about him were both remarkable and unremarkable: Heller called him \u201ca human\u201d who \u201ctreats everyone like people.\u201d Meg Ryan, who starred with him in \u201cSleepless in Seattle\u201d and other movies said he has an \u201castronomical\u201d curiosity. Peter Scolari, who co-starred with him on the sitcom \u201cBosom Buddies\u201d and then \u201cLucky Guy\u201d on Broadway, called him \u201cthis very special man who is touched by God.\u201d Sally Field told me that Tom Hanks is so good that it actually makes her feel bad. She calls him \u201cOnce in a lifetime Tom.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hearing that made me think of something Tom Junod said to me in Toronto, how he went into the Mister Rogers story looking for who Fred was but came out knowing only what he did. He stared at all his reporting for a long time before he realized that the doing is actually the thing we should be paying attention to. \u201cI don\u2019t know if Fred was the mask or the mask was Fred,\u201d he said. \u201cBut in the end does it even matter?\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not sure where we got the concept of an Everyman, but Tom Hanks isn\u2019t really it. I don\u2019t know people with hundreds of typewriters. He is the Platonic ideal of a man, a projection of what we wish we were, or, more worrisome, a theory of what we actually are, and, well: Have you read the other pages of this newspaper?<\/p>\n
I am too old for Mister Rogers. My children are too old for Mister Rogers, too. So instead I showed them \u201cSplash,\u201d then \u201cForrest Gump,\u201d then \u201cBig,\u201d then \u201cA League of Their Own.\u201d I showed them \u201cThat Thing You Do!\u201d and parts of \u201cCast Away.\u201d I told them about the man who heard I wasn\u2019t feeling well and adjusted his schedule for me. I told them that it doesn\u2019t matter why you do nice things; all that matters is that you do them. And one day, something changed. I had just finished \u201cToy Story 4,\u201d and suddenly all my algorithms were recommending openhearted movies with heroes and good values, and I realized that I had begun to feel a little better. My heart was never a spike; it was always an umbrella but sometimes it would invert against a storm. That day I recalibrated, and suddenly my umbrella was upright, once again able to shield me from the weather. It was enough. It was more than enough. This is an accurate reflection of the time Tom Hanks spent with a journalist.<\/p>\n
Read it all<\/a>.<\/p>\n Tom Hanks is exactly as nice as you think he is. No surprises there. So maybe this could just be a story that makes you feel better. https:\/\/t.co\/tMBLXGYS5W<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 The New York Times (@nytimes) November 14, 2019<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n