Oscar-winning actor to give public interview in February
A star will shine at Lafayette on Feb 13, when Tom Hanks visits campus for a public interview session with President Alison Byerly and history professor Donald Miller.
The event, which takes place in Kamine Gym in the Kirby Sports Center and is free to attend, but all 1700 seats have already been taken. There will be a live stream of the event in Colton Chapel, however, which can seat an additional 600 persons.
Miller and Hanks have a long association, having worked with each other back in 2010 on the HBO miniseries “The Pacific,”on which Miller was a historical consultant. Miller also co-produced a WWII documentary entitled “He Has Seen War”with Hanks in 2011. They are currently working together on adapting Miller’s acclaimed book “Masters of the Air: America’s Bomber Boys Who Fought the Air War against Nazi Germany”into a miniseries for HBO entitled “The Mighty Eighth,”which has a tentative release date of early 2017 according to IMDB.
Hanks is one of the most renowned actors in Hollywood, being one of only five actors in history to win back-to-back academy awards (for 1993’s “Philadelphia”and 1994’s “Forrest Gump”) along with Spencer Tracy, Luise Rainer, Katharine Hepburn and Jason Robards. Forbes estimates him as the third highest grossing actor of all time, and his films have grossed a combined $8 billion to date. His filmography includes 1998’s “Saving Private Ryan,”1995’s “Apollo 13,”the Toy Story franchise, 2013’s “Captain Phillips,”and 2015’s “Bridge of Spies.”He is one of the few actors to have a celestial body named after him, with Asteroid 12818 Tom Hanks—named by NASA.
Miller is a New York Times bestselling author of seven books, with a primary focus on World War II. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Great Lakes National Book Award for Outstanding Book for “Masters of the Air.”
The interview is meant to be informal, as Hanks is present in a personal capacity rather than in his capacity as an actor and producer, according to Lafayette College’s official website. At press time, no official topics for the interview have been made public.
