Photographing Tom Hanks

Tom Hanks may be as well known for being genuinely nice as he is for his film career, and he was certainly nice, but he was also 30 minutes early. And that’s not a good thing.

I’ve learned to arrive many hours before the subject - in this case it was 3 hours - but one still maps out that last hour pretty precisely and that all gets thrown in the air when your famous subject strolls in and starts making friendly conversation with your crew. 

As my assistants did the final lighting adjustments I distracted Tom. As he is an avid collector of vintage typewriters (with over 100 in his home office) I had brought two working models and he was happy to bang on the keys and give us a quick evaluation of this one’s condition (the portable, pictured here he considered in “fair” order). We talked of Big (it was showing on the flight to LA) and he rolled his eyes at my mention of it, Ken Burns and Lynn Novack’s The Vietnam War, and Walt Disney (”All of his profits he put into his next ventures, so that he was continually cash strapped,” he told me with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes).

Once we got into the swing of the session all was well. Tom was easy-going the whole time but the team could now relax a bit now, knowing that we were on track for a strong shoot. For the final couple of minutes I asked if he’d be game to slip outside the studio and shoot on the sidewalk. And, of course, that extra shot is the best of the day and lives as the opener for our Guardian Weekend story.