How Tom Hanks ended up in his first music video: “Next thing I know, boom!”
Say what you will about Tom Hanks and his acting, but there’s one thing that we can all agree on: that he’s one of the most deliberate actors of our generation.
When looking at the broader trajectory of Hanks’ career, it’s clear that his position is one of the more respectable, especially when it comes to the drama-leaning roles that hinge on stories and worlds with relatable sociopolitical plots and contexts. This wasn’t always the case, of course, and Hanks has his share of less popular box office flops, but these are neither here nor there when it comes to his bigger career milestones.
For instance, it says a lot that when people think of Hanks, they immediately think of his more serious roles or award-winning roles, like his stint as the low-intelligence, charismatic Forrest Gump in Forrest Gump, or the dedicated FBI agent Carl Hanratty in Catch Me if You Can, or the Krakozhian traveller Viktor Navorski in The Terminal, or the unfortunate merchant mariner Richard Phillips in Captain Phillips.
When Hanks’ name is attached to any project, therefore, you immediately know it’s going to grip you more deeply, even if it’s the type of story or genre that you’re not usually all that into. Maybe that’s the beauty of it; that there’s always an authentic touch in every film Hanks is involved in, and even those that aren’t up to his own personal standard contain something worth taking away.
While discussing some of his less successful projects, for instance, Hanks once said that there’s no point in dwelling too much on it, so long as he’s certain he put his all into it. As he explained to The Guardian, “I made a movie that altered my entire consciousness – Cloud Atlas – I thought, jeez, this thing is so fab; it’s the only movie I’ve been in that I’ve seen more than twice. And it didn’t do any business. And there’s nothing you can do about it.”
This attitude – that sometimes it’s worth doing, even when you don’t already know the outcome – is what has drawn Hanks to some of the more off-kilter projects over the years. While he generally tends to stay in his respective lane, there are occasions when he tips outside of them, just to see what it’s like. One such project was appearing in Carly Rae Jepsen’s music video for ‘I Really Like You’.
According to the actor, the idea passed him by when he was out one night having a drink with a few friends. “I was at dinner with friends of ours who work with Carly, and they said, ‘We were maybe going to ask you if you’d want to do this thing,’ and I literally had a beer in my hand, and I said, ‘Yeah, sure, I’ll do it,'” Hanks told ET. “And that was it! Next thing I know, boom! Carly Rae Jepsen video.”
The idea works so well because Hanks’ involvement was totally unexpected. The concept was to originally include a “surprise” actor who would lip-sync the lyrics alongside Jepsen, and when you’ve seen the video, it’s hard to think of anyone who would have done the job quite as well as Hanks.
In many ways, this also only worked because of how strange the crossing of worlds was, proving that Hanks might be one of the most deliberate and serious actors in the broader Hollywood pool, but he’ll never turn down the opportunity to pop up in other places, all in the name of fun.
