Tom Hanks Quotes & Sayings

I must say that I do wrestle with the amount of money I make, but at the end of the day what am I gonna say? I took less money so Rupert Murdoch could have more? — Tom Hanks

When I work, a lot of times I have to lose weight, and I do that, but in my regular life I was not eating right, and I was not getting enough exercise. But by the nature of my diet and that lifestyle - boom! The end result was high blood sugars that reach the levels where it becomes Type 2 diabetes. I share that with a gajillion other people. — Tom Hanks

My job has always been to hold a mirror up to nature. — Tom Hanks

By and large, the making of motion pictures is all about, 'Let's ratchet it up.' And I always think, 'We don't need to ratchet this up.' If you do, don't call it 'Captain Phillips' or 'The Maersk Alabama.' Call it something else, and then you have carte blanche to do anything, down to sea serpents and aliens. — Tom Hanks

Movie-making is telling a story with the best technology at your disposal. — Tom Hanks

The Pixar people continuously amaze me. They come up with something that actually looks as though it takes place in this happy, real-world. Every plot line is not just plausible, but oddly authentic. The stories are full of adventure, humor and love. The characters are written with great human dimension. I don't know how they do it but they astound me. — Tom Hanks

I have high blood sugars, and Type 2 diabetes is not going to kill me. But I just have to eat right, and exercise, and lose weight, and watch what I eat, and I will be fine for the rest of my life. — Tom Hanks

Yeah! I got type-two diabetes! I'm sure there's going to be some media scandal now, saying I got it because I gained and lost weight for movie parts or something - but I doubt that. — Tom Hanks

There's no substitute for a great love who says, 'No matter what's wrong with you, you're welcome at this table. — Tom Hanks

The most accurate representation of how I feel is that I'm incredibly lucky to be working in this structure where people get paid millions to read the news on TV. And, yes, it is insane. And there is nothing I can say beyond acknowledging my immense good fortune, and being aware that I'm blessed, and aware that it isn't going to last forever. — Tom Hanks

Directing is a constant test of your communicative powers. You're constantly trying to explain people your vision of what you want and steer these tiny little details into a cohesive thing. — Tom Hanks

We are all God's animated cartoons. — Tom Hanks

I just know that every man I kill the farther away from home I feel. — Tom Hanks

Mama always said, dying was a part of life. I sure wish it wasn't. — Tom Hanks

If there are nine guys auditioning and they're all gorgeous, I have an advantage, because gorgeous guys are a dime a dozen. But if they need someone else - like a goofy guy with bad hair who is just okay - then that's me. And finally, the other 2 percent who audition are geniuses that I could never touch. — Tom Hanks

Saying no to something is actually much more powerful than saying yes. — Tom Hanks

Once humankind has been some place and found it
entrancing, they always go back, I think in the history of the
human race, the moon has been the first place we've gone to and said,
'OK, we don't need to go back there again. — Tom Hanks

When I was growing up, everybody in charge, my parents and teachers, had all survived the war, and they talked about the war like it was the Kraken - you know, this huge beast that roamed the earth during their formative years. — Tom Hanks

'Larry Crowne' is about as bummed out a human being as one can be when he loses his job. What he is able to enjoy is something that may not be available to everybody. But it's about the value of being willing to get and willing to give good advice. — Tom Hanks

Mass-market movies have become about one thing. They kind of declare themselves right off the bat ... But when I go to see (a film), I want to be surprised. I want to see something I never expected. And when you get that, it should be celebrated. — Tom Hanks

I'm glad I didn't have to fight in any war. I'm glad I didn't have to pick up a gun. I'm glad I didn't get killed or kill somebody. I hope my kids enjoy the same lack of manhood. — Tom Hanks

May you live as long as you want and not want as long as you live. — Tom Hanks

There is something basic about protecting land by taking it off the market. People should be able to enjoy where they live while at the same time protect the plants and animals around them. — Tom Hanks

Making a film is to make sure that everybody looks forward to coming to work. — Tom Hanks

I love what I do for a living, it's the greatest job in the world, but you have to survive an awful lot of attention that you don't truly deserve and you have to live up to your professional responsibilities and I'm always trying to balance that with what is really important. — Tom Hanks

But I also think all of the great stories in literature deal with loneliness. Sometimes it's by way of heartbreak, sometimes it's by way of injustice, sometimes it's by way of fate. There's an infinite number of ways to examine it. — Tom Hanks

Every job requires a certain riding of a horse. — Tom Hanks

I went to college because I didn't have anywhere else to go and it was a fabulous hang. And while I was there I was exposed to this world that I didn't know was possible. — Tom Hanks

It just so happens that my body type and my lifestyle gives me a preclusion for high blood sugars. — Tom Hanks

I will entertain anything; it doesn't matter. You know, it's not obviously about the price, it's not about who, it's kind of about when and what. It's material, that's all. — Tom Hanks

I don't follow football, I just love the name Aston Villa. Here in England you have other footballing entities like Manchester and Arsenal and Chelsea — Tom Hanks

There's a small percentage of people who can act. There's a small percentage who get to do this for a living. There's a swath of the population that are able to keep a story in their head and fight all the battles against self-consciousness and the surreal unnaturalness of acting in a movie. The technical aspects you can learn fairly quickly. — Tom Hanks

If it wasn't hard, everyone would do it. It's the hard that makes it great. — Tom Hanks

If you can feel like a good man in your 40s, you can feel like a better man in your 50s, a Superman in your 60s, and maybe a Spider-Man in your 70s. — Tom Hanks

If not for John Adams leading a revolution against Great Britain ... This would be the BAFTAs. — Tom Hanks

If things were easy to find, they wouldn't be worth finding. — Tom Hanks

I am who I am, and I think I have a good nature, by and large. But if someone takes advantage of that good nature, well then, you know, I'm not that nice a guy. — Tom Hanks

But television, when I was doing it, was all about scoring. You had to make these jokes bang, do whatever you could to make the material really pop. And if it didn't, there was something wrong with the material, or with you. — Tom Hanks

I think I'm lucky that I had kids as spread out as much as I did, 'cause my son, my oldest, was born when I was 21. And my youngest is 15 now. He was born when I was 40, you know? — Tom Hanks

This is what we storytellers do. We restore order with imagination. — Tom Hanks

Some people are cowards ... I think by and large a third of people are villains, a third are cowards, and a third are heroes. Now, a villain and a coward can choose to be a hero, but they've got to make that choice. — Tom Hanks

If I was to direct Ron Howard, I guarantee you, I would put him through a living hell every day. I would demand so much of him. We wouldn't quit until he leaves the set crying. Weeping! Spent! — Tom Hanks

We are still in the position of waking up and having a choice. Do I make the world better today somehow, or do I not bother? — Tom Hanks

And I'm not apolitical - I'm very specific in my politics. But a lot of the time it's nobody's business unless you're over at my house having dinner. — Tom Hanks

You cannot look up at the night sky on the Planet Earth and not wonder what it's like to be up there amongst the stars. And I always look up at the moon and see it as the single most romantic place within the cosmos. — Tom Hanks

There was a period of time in Los Angeles when I wondered if I was just going to lose everything. — Tom Hanks

Larger-than-life characters make up about .01 percent of the world's population. — Tom Hanks

In the creative process you come to loggerheads and you just have to keep the process moving forward, even if that requires jumping on a plane and flying to London. It's a good thing it's fun, otherwise it would be too much work. — Tom Hanks

As a boy Id often spend my days biking on riverbeds and arroyos and come home exhausted. I realize now how much I took for granted having the natural world so close at hand. It wasnt until I moved away, first to New York and then to Los Angeles, that I realized how much I missed the outdoors. — Tom Hanks

You don't necessarily go in to talk to the person to try to find some secret key to the lock. — Tom Hanks

The power of the individual is as powerful as the universe is infinite. — Tom Hanks

I want to have a good time myself. I don't want to dread going to work no matter what the gig is. I think, selfishly, I will make sure that I have a good time; how about that? — Tom Hanks

You have to adhere to a philosophy that the life unexamined is not worth living, because otherwise you're just living from day to day and you don't have any real sense of yourself or where you are. — Tom Hanks

I've made over 20 movies, and 5 of them are good. — Tom Hanks

What we're doing with Band of Brothers is trying to put it into human terms, so it is not just a flickering, black and white myth on a screen, it is a resonant story. I want the audience to recognize themselves in these men. They're not just mythic heroes. — Tom Hanks

I would not want to live in a country that would have me as a leader in any sort of political bent. — Tom Hanks

You learn more from getting your butt kicked than getting it kissed. — Tom Hanks

Human beings do things for a reason, even if sometimes it's the wrong reason. — Tom Hanks

Even the simplest choice can make a jaw-dropping difference in our world. — Tom Hanks

There isn't any great mystery about me. What I do is glamorous and has an awful lot of white-hot attention placed on it. But the actual work requires the same discipline and passion as any job you love doing, be it as a very good pipe fitter or a highly creative artist. — Tom Hanks

In the 1998 Oscars, I found myself in the bathroom in a stall, next to Tom Selleck. So I leaned over and I said 'looks like we're a couple of peeing Toms. His angry silence is something I'll never forget. — Tom Hanks

I'm not interested in doing something edgy with a capital E just so everyone knows, 'Oh, OK, now he's showing us he can do edgy.' — Tom Hanks

Prior to Saving Private Ryan I never worked with men. I was always working with some babe, and it was always about falling in love, and it just got turned around. I'm not looking for any particular kind of story. I wait until it comes across my desk. — Tom Hanks

I've made quite a number of movies like Castaway and a few others where I'm the only guy in the movie and the only place to be is right next to the camera in costume ready to go in order to get it. The years, and more specifically probably the four months prior to beginning shooting, is where the big preparation is that the director does because I knew we were going to get on the set. And the good news is, if you're the boss, if it ain't good, you don't use it. You just cut it out. — Tom Hanks

The more men I kill, the more far away from home I feel
Saving Private Ryan — Tom Hanks

It was incredibly cheesy set with torches [TV's Survivor] - it looked like the lobby of the Enchanted Tiki Room at Disneyland. And here as some guy pulling names out of a coconut, and I said, 'This is the thing that has made American mass media stop in their tracks? — Tom Hanks

A hero is somebody who voluntarily walks into the unknown.
Tom Hanks — Tom Hanks

Oprah Winfrey today you are surrounded by nothing but love. — Tom Hanks

I've talked to a number of actors who have gained weight for roles, and just the sheer physical toll it puts on one's knees and shoulders - no one wants to do it again. I'm 57 and I don't think I'm going to take on any job or go on vacation again and see to it that I can gain 30 pounds. — Tom Hanks

Never give up because you never know what the tide will bring in the next day. — Tom Hanks

I had to say no to 'Fantasy Island' back when I was doing 'Bosom Buddies.' — Tom Hanks

My doctor said, 'If you can weigh what you weighed in high school, you'll essentially be healthy and not have Type 2 diabetes.' Well, I'm gonna have Type 2 diabetes, because there is no way I can weigh as much as I did in high school. — Tom Hanks

I don't ask for much. I don't ask to be rich, and I don't ask to be famous, and I don't ask to play center field for the New York Yankees. I just want to get married and have a wife, and a house, and I want to have a kid, and I want to go see him be a tooth in the school play! — Tom Hanks

Truth is, I'll never know all there is to know about you just as you will never know all there is to know about me. Humans are by nature too complicated to be understood fully. So, we can choose either to approach our fellow human beings with suspicion or to approach them with an open mind, a dash of optimism and a great deal of candour. — Tom Hanks

I'm lucky enough to be able to make only movies I'm interested in seeing. That has to be an instinctive thrust. The audience knows when you're faking it. They can hang any kind of moniker they want on me. — Tom Hanks

Mama always had a way of explaining things so I could understand them. — Tom Hanks

If you look at romantic comedies as pieces of commerce, the audience is looking for wish fulfillment. — Tom Hanks

As a young man, even if I was going to see a play or a film by myself, I didn't feel like I was alone. There was something that was unfolding up there that brought me into it. And I recognised that. For those two hours, it made me feel like I belonged to something really good. — Tom Hanks

Are you crying? There's no crying. There's no crying in baseball. — Tom Hanks

Audiences crave something they've never seen before. That's what they want. They want to be dazzled. They want to go in either to have their expectations blown out of the water, or have no expectations and are dazzled by the decisions that we [filmmakers] made. — Tom Hanks

My wife and I, we met making a movie. This is not just our job, it's our life. It's what we do naturally whether we're working together or not. — Tom Hanks

Tweeting is like sending out cool telegrams to your friends once a week. — Tom Hanks

The truth is that everyone pays attention to who's number one at the box office. And none of it matters, because the only thing that really exists is the connection the audience has with a movie. — Tom Hanks

The same way that I know that I'll never do a movie as good or as celebrated as 'Forrest Gump,' I know that I'll never do a movie as bad as 'Bonfire of the Vanities.' — Tom Hanks

The filmmakers aren't running the studios anymore. Sometimes people who like films are making them, but by and large, they have to go report quarterly earnings and all that stuff. The competition is so huge that it's very hard to get people to show up to see any movie in the theater, much less an original one that isn't a version of something else they saw. — Tom Hanks

Now, learning how to make a movie is something you can figure out in about an afternoon. The physics of it, the marks, the lights, etc. What's hard to do is to suspend your own feelings of self consciousness. The natural actors can do that; they can become part of a characterization and learn how to maintain it. — Tom Hanks

College isn't necessary for everybody and it's only from what you put into it what you go there for. — Tom Hanks

My kid could get a bad X-ray and I could get a call from the doctor saying I have something growing in my bum and that would change my perspective on everything instantaneously, on what is and what is not important. — Tom Hanks

In your mid-30s, it's time to start playing guys of compromise. And as you get older, men of bitter compromise — Tom Hanks

I always wanted to play Lestrade of Scotland Yard 'cause he's a buffoon that gets to wear a uniform. I thought that would be fun. — Tom Hanks

That's what's nice about directing a film and having it done: There's nothing more I can do about it. It's done. That's it. All I can do is let it go and hope that people are kind to it. — Tom Hanks

I know the Pope is opposed to the use of condoms. All I can say is, I am a spiritual man and I've been happily married for 21 years. I don't even know what a condom is anymore. — Tom Hanks

Acting still rings my bell as much as it did in high school. Plus, I can now indulge my interests as a producer as well. My work is more fun than fun but, best of all, it's still very scary. You are always walking some kind of high wire. — Tom Hanks

I did a 'Love Boat!' And based on my trip on the 'Love Boat,' I said, 'I'd just as soon not do 'Fantasy Island.' — Tom Hanks

Growing up in northern California has had a big influence on my love and respect for the outdoors. When I lived in Oakland, we would think nothing of driving to Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz one day and then driving to the foothills of the Sierras the next day. — Tom Hanks

When I was 21 years old, I had a job playing Santa Claus in a shopping centre in Sacramento. I was rail thin, so it's not like I was a traditional Santa Claus even then. I had a square stomach; that was the shape of the sofa cushion that I had stuffed into my pants. — Tom Hanks

An animatic is a process where every voice and every sound effect is added to rough animated drawings and it lasts exactly as long as the final movie. So you actually get to go into a screening room with the rest of the cast and you get to see it all at the same time. — Tom Hanks

As an actor I am always waiting for my luck to run out. — Tom Hanks

It's not a mid-life crisis. It's a mid-life disaster. A mid-life crisis is when you wake up with everything and you go "I have everything but I'm still unhappy." — Tom Hanks

Dear God, thank you for my life. I forgot how big and wonderful it is. — Tom Hanks