Tom Hanks on Graham Norton: ‘Clint Eastwood is intimidating as hell’

The legendary actor plays a heroic pilot in true story Sully
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Ben Travis25 November 2016

Tom Hanks has revealed he was found Clint Eastwood ‘intimidating’ on his new film.

The Hollywood actor is soon to be seen in Eastwood’s new film Sully – the true story of pilot Chesley ‘Sully’ Sullenberger, who performed an emergency landing in New York’s Hudson River.

Talking to Graham Norton, Hanks spoke about Eastwood’s directing style.

“He treats his actors like horses because when he did the Sixties series Rawhide, the director would shout ‘action’ and all the horses bolted,” he said.

So TV

“So when [Eastwood]’s in charge he says in a really quiet soft voice, ‘all right, go ahead.’ And instead of shouting ‘cut’, he says ‘that’s enough of that.’

“It’s intimidating as hell!”

It turns out the real Sullenberger was also an interesting person to work with on the film.

“Sully was very particular about how we portrayed the procedure and the emotions,” Hanks said.

“He pulled out this dog-eared, stapled and notated script that he had read. Post-its, stapled index cards all over it – I’m sure his wife had even written ‘no’ across it in lipstick.

“We went through every page and every moment, every beat had been commented on. He had opinions!”

Also appearing on Norton’s red sofa are Gemma Arterton, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Mo Farah and Olly Murs.

BBC One, 10.35pm

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