Trailer #2: ‘Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close’ starring Tom Hanks, Sandra Bullock, Thomas Horn, Max von Sydow, Viola Davis, John Goodman, Jeffrey Wright

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close: Based on the acclaimed novel, the film tells the story of one young boy’s journey from heartbreaking loss to the healing power of self-discovery, set against the backdrop of the tragic events of September 11. Eleven-year-old Oskar Schell is an exceptional child: amateur inventor, Francophile, pacifist. And after finding a mysterious key that belonged to his father, who died in the World Trade Center on 9/11, he embarks on an exceptional journey–an urgent, secret search through the five boroughs of New York. As Oskar roams the city, he encounters a motley assortment of humanity, who are all survivors in their own ways. Ultimately, Oskar’s journey ends where it began, but with the solace of that most human experience: love. courtesy of trailers.apple.com

Director: Stephen Daldry

Cast: Tom Hanks, Sandra Bullock, Thomas Horn, Max von Sydow, Viola Davis, John Goodman, Jeffrey Wright

In Theaters: December 25th   Read more

Trailer: ‘Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close’ starring Tom Hanks, Sandra Bullock, Viola Davis, John Goodman, James Gandolfini

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close: Based on the acclaimed novel of the same name, “Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close” tells the story of one young boy’s journey from heartbreaking loss to the healing power of self-discovery, set against the backdrop of the tragicevents of September 11. Eleven-year-old Oskar Schell is an exceptional child: amateur inventor, Francophile, pacifist. And after finding a mysterious key that belonged to his father, who died in the World Trade Center on 9/11, he embarks on an exceptional journey–an urgent, secret search through the five boroughs of New York. As Oskar roams the city, he encounters a motley assortment of humanity, who are all survivors in their own ways. Ultimately, Oskar’s journey ends where it began, but with the solace of that most human experience: love. courtesy of trailers.apple.com

Director: Stephen Daldry
Cast: Tom Hanks, Sandra Bullock, Thomas Horn, Max von Sydow, Viola Davis, John Goodman, Jeffrey Wright, James Gandolfini

In theaters: December 25th, 2011
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Tom Hanks: “A lot of actors are nuts”

Tom Hanks clearly understands that actors can do great things, but they are not always able get the things they want to done; enter the role of producer which allows the actor more creative control over the end product.

With his new film, Larry Crowne, Hanks explains his decision to add the title of producer to his resume which already included actor, writer and director. “A lot of actors are nuts, and they don’t want to do the long-haul  diligence. My joke about producing is that it’s getting somebody to do something they don’t want to do, and telling somebody else they don’t get to do the thing they want to do. It’s not easy.”

Yet Hanks says he has no regrets about his decision to expand his on set duties. “I sought to be creative without being at the mercy of the phone. Most actors have to wait for permission to go out and do their job. And I didn’t want to be a guy who was sitting in Los Angeles waiting for a call. In order to change that, I needed to have alliance with people who knew how to make things work. I made those alliances [by forming] Playtone, and I was able to get back to my original  desire, and that was to answer the question, ‘How can we do this?’
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Taraji P. Henson Would’ve Played “A Tree or a Rock” to Act Alongside Tom Hanks

In a recent interview with The Huffington Post, actress Taraji P. Henson talked about being cast in the latest Tom Hanks vehicle, Larry Crowne, and what it was like working with the legendary actor.

“Apparently, Tom wanted me involved,” recalled the 41-year-old. “So he called my manager and my manager called me and said, ‘Tom Hanks really wants you to be in his movie’ and I said, ‘Sure.’ And my manager was like, ‘Maybe you should read the script first,’ and I was like, ‘No, I don’t have to read the script, it’s Tom Hanks, that’s a no brainer. I don’t care, I could play a tree or a rock, it’s Tom Hanks.’”

Over the course of her decade-long career, Henson has had roles in 2005’s Hustle & Flow, 2008’s The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and 2009’s I Can Do Bad All by Myself, among others. In Larry Crowne, which is in theaters Friday, she plays the neighbor of Hanks’ character, a middle-aged man who decides to re-enroll in junior college.

“It’s amazing working for him. The set is very stress free,” Henson said. “Even though he was director, producer, he co-wrote it, there was no tension. And I’ve been on sets where the director is just wearing that one hat and there’s just so much tension. And it was a low budget. And you know, you’re gunning it. It felt so easy, breezy, we laughed a lot on the set.”

Tom Hanks on “Larry Crowne”, Hollywood Cynicism and Balancing his Roles as Writer, Director and Actor

Tom Hanks is well known for his attraction to hopeful, optimistic characters, which is why his turn as the titular Larry Crowne is unsurprising. The film, which opens this Friday, tells the tale of an unemployed, middle-aged man who reinvents himself at community college.

Hanks wasn’t merely the star of the film, he wore three different hats: writer, director and actor. In a recent interview with NPR, Hanks admitted to the difficulty of balancing these distinct roles, saying, “Writing a movie and then directing the result of that script is … a personal virus that you have to fight. It’s a fever that you get that takes you over.”

The biggest challenge was not in the filming process, but in the preceding six-month preparation process. Hanks continued, “That’s when it’s hard to go back and forth between being a director who wants to tell a story with a specific sort of sound and look to it, as opposed to the actor just saying, ‘And what am I going to say here exactly and why am I saying it?…That’s where the battle between being a director and an actor is really fought.”
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6 Clips and a Featurette from “Larry Crowne” starring Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts

Larry Crowne opens July 1st and even with it having one of the worst movie poster out today, I still really want to see it.

You really can’t go wrong with a Tom Hanks or Julia Roberts movie and when they’re working together, well, it’s something you should see. That, and it looks like it’s going to be a nice, adult-oriented movie.

Hopefully it won’t get demolished from Transformers which also comes out next week.

 

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Bryan Cranston Talks About “Larry Crowne” Sex Scene with Julia Roberts

According to a recent interview with Larry Crowne co-star Bryan Cranston, the actor wore “slightly less clothes” than one disgraced politician during filming for a sex scene with Julia Roberts, who plays his professor wife in the upcoming movie.

“I’m laying on top of her. You know what I’m wearing? Slightly less clothes than Anthony Weiner,” the 55-year-old Breaking Bad actor told ReelzChannel’s Steve Patterson. Of course, Weiner is the New York congressman who accidentally sent a picture of his erect penis (thankfully hidden by his underwear) to all of his Twitter followers late last month.

As Cranston told it, he wore nothing but a skin-colored pouch so that no actual genital contact was made between Cranston and Roberts during their steamy scene. “That was my wardrobe,” he explained.

Larry Crowne also stars Tom Hanks as the titular character and tells the story of a middle-aged man who loses his job and decides to head back to community college, where he meets the woman played by Roberts.

Video after the jump.

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Tom Hanks Talks Early Years And The 3 Secrets To His Success

Promoting his upcoming comedy-drama Larry Crowne, co-star/director Tom Hanks (opposite Julia Roberts in the film) recently sat down with W. The resulting conversation provided tremendous insight into the beginnings of the film legend’s career and what drew him to acting in the first place.

“I didn’t think acting was a job,” said Hanks, whose first acting gig was in a Chabot College production of Our Town. “I did take a class called Drama in Performance. We read plays and went and saw them performed. That was the transformational experience for me: There was no chick, no girlfriend you were trying to impress. The whole world went black, and you were one with the play.”

Hanks also recalled that both theater and film attracted him, albeit in different ways. “Theater contained possibilities. Movies were abstract to me,” he told W, adding that it was beyond the realm of his imagination to ever appear on the big screen.

After working as a hotel bellman who would go on auditions during off-hours, Hanks finally broke into Hollywood and, ironically, acting did become a full-time job. He starred in innocuous 1980s comedies like Splash, Big and The ‘Burbs, but eventually opted for a more serious turn by taking roles such as a homosexual attorney in 1993’s Philadelphia. “I wanted to play men instead of boys. In your mid-30s, it’s time to start playing guys of compromise. And as you get older, men of bitter compromise.”

The three secrets to Hanks’ success? “Show up on time, know what to say, and have an idea about the character. And when I direct, that’s what I expect from my actors. You’d be amazed how hard it is to do those three things.”

Via W

WhoSay offers celebrities the right to retain control over their images

Tom Hanks likes to use Twitter to share the occasional on set photo with his 1.8 million followers. Now there is a site where those photos can be sent that allow him and other celebrities to have a new sense of control over their presence on social media.

People on Twitter can use services like TwitPic, Yfrog or Plixi to share photos with their friends and family.  Celebrities have concerns with these services because they aquire ownership rights to uploaded photos and can place ads alongside them. Enter a new company called WhoSay that offers similar services, but ownership of uploaded images are retained by the stars themselves.

WhoSay has been up and running out of the Los Angeles office building of the Creative Artists Agency since last year. CAA represents an impressive list of famous names, including Hanks. His WhoSay site includes the words “copyright Tom Hanks” along with fine print at the bottom declaring his legal ownership of all content and a warning of “fines and imprisonment” for improper use.

There are 15 people on staff at WhoSay in offices in New York, London and Los Angeles.  Creative Artists and Amazon.com are among investors in the company.
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Live in Cleveland? Want to see Tom Hanks?

Tom Hanks has never forgotten the Cleveland theater company that gave him his start as an actor and will come back for a fundraiser on October 12th.

He’ll be doing a show called “Tom Hanks at the Hanna” at the downtown Hanna Theatre.

The theater was home of the Great Lakes Theater Festival, which was called the Great Lakes Shakespeare Festival when he was hired in 1977 for his first acting job, paying $45 a week.

He worked at the theater for three summers and got his Actors’ Equity card while there.

Top seats for the upcoming event are $250 and include dinner with him.

Proceeds will go toward the Hanna’s restoration.

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