Hollywood legend Tom Hanks is about to appear on the big screen playing, a number of different roles, in Cloud Atlas. When asked whether he found playing multiple roles fun and exciting or more of a challenge, Tom admitted that it was actually a little bit of both.
Hanks told Collider, “Both, without a doubt. Yes, it was great. We always knew who we were playing, the next day. We’d read the call sheet, so we knew where we were going to have to be and how long it was going to take to do it. Sometimes you make films where you’re playing the same guy, but you go to six different locations. You shoot part of it in Iceland, you shoot part of it in the Sahara desert and you shoot part of it in L.A. This was like that, but squared or cubed.”
He added, “It was like a algorithm because the concentration and the output of each one of the characters was so completely different. They all required a different energy and a different vibe that you carried around with you all day, and they all felt different because the costume and the make-up changed the way you stood or sat or tried to take a nap, on occasion.”
Ton continued, “It was almost like a huge amount of the “work” was done for us. So much of what we have to do is pretend it’s happening for the first time. On this movie, literally every day, you were doing something that would never, ever be repeated again because that character was going to go away in another day or two.”
As well as starring Tom Hanks, Cloud Atlas also stars Halle Berry and Hugo Weaving and was written and directed by Tom Tykwer. Cloud Atlas is set to be released in the US on October 26 but the UK will have to wait until February 22, 2013 for it to hit the big screen there.
