Tom Hanks

Thomas "Tom" Jeffrey Hanks (born July 9, 1956) is a two-time Academy Award-winning American film actor, Emmy winning director, voice-over artist and movie producer who starred in family-friendly and screwball comedies before achieving notable success as a dramatic actor. (Pfeiffer, pp125-129)

As of September 24, 2006, Hanks is the highest-grossing "lead" actor of all time, with a combined gross of over USD$3.3 billion and a worldwide gross of nearly $6 billion.

In school, Hanks was unpopular with students and teachers alike, telling Rolling Stone magazine: "I was a geek, a spaz. I was horribly, painfully, terribly shy. At the same time, I was the guy who'd yell out funny captions during filmstrips. But I didn't get into trouble. I was always a real good kid and pretty responsible." (Trakin, pp144-147)

Amos Hanks remarried in 1965 to the former Frances Wong, a San Francisco native of Chinese descent. Frances had three children, two of whom lived with Tom during his high school years. Tom acted in school plays, including "South Pacific", while attending Skyline High School in Oakland, California.

It was during his years studying theater that Hanks met Vincent Dowling, head of the Great Lakes Theater Festival in Cleveland. At Dowling's suggestion, Hanks became an intern at the Festival, which stretched into a three-year experience that covered everything from lighting to set design to stage management. Such a commitment required that Hanks drop out of college, but with this under his belt, a future in acting was in the cards. Hanks won the Cleveland Critics Circle Award for best actor for his performance as Proteus in Shakespeare's Two Gentlemen of Verona, one of the few times he played a villain. (Gardner, pp45-53)

From Cleveland, Hanks moved to New York, where he scratched out a living until being "discovered" during open auditions that the ABC was conducting. He landed the role of Kip Wilson on the ABC situation comedy "Bosom Buddies" at the age of 23.

In 1979, Hanks moved to New York City, where he acted for the Riverside Shakespeare Company. In addition, he made his film debut in the low-budget slasher film, He Knows You're Alone, and got a part in a television movie entitled Mazes and Monsters. He continued to audition and finally landed a role on an ABC television pilot called Bosom Buddies. "It was flukesville", Hanks told Newsweek about the show. Hanks flew to Los Angeles, California where he was teamed with Peter Scolari as a pair of young advertising men forced to dress as women so they could live in an inexpensive all-female hotel. He had previously partnered with Scolari in the 1970s game show, Make Me Laugh.

Period of hits and misses

More comedies followed, but none clicked with audiences. With Nothing in Common (1986)—about a young man alienated from his parents who must re-establish a relationship with his father, played by Jackie Gleason—Hanks began to establish the credentials of not only a comic actor but of someone who could carry a serious role. "It changed my desires about working in ...