{"id":53157,"date":"2018-07-16T11:32:55","date_gmt":"2018-07-16T15:32:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/?p=53157"},"modified":"2022-09-29T11:46:51","modified_gmt":"2022-09-29T15:46:51","slug":"checking-in","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/2018\/07\/16\/checking-in\/","title":{"rendered":"Checking in"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

From left: Tom Hanks, Michael Goldner, who played Hanks\u2019 sidekick in \u201cThe Mandrake;\u201d and Stuart McDowell, artistic director of theDepartment of Theatre, Dance and Motion Pictures; following a performance of \u201cHenry IV Part I and II\u201d at an outdoor theater in Los Angeles. (Contributed photo)<\/p><\/div>\n

Acclaimed actor, producer and director Tom Hanks, who charmed students, faculty, staff, alumni and others during a visit to Wright State in 2016, continues to enjoy his memories of those moments and his strong relationship with the university.<\/p>\n

So says Stuart McDowell, who paid a visit to Hanks in Los Angeles in June.<\/p>\n

McDowell, artistic director of Wright State\u2019s Department of Theatre, Dance and Motion Pictures<\/a>, is an old friend of Hanks and was largely responsible for Hanks\u2019 visit to Wright State to dedicate the Tom Hanks Center for Motion Pictures<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted to keep that memory fresh and continue to nurture the relationship between Tom and Wright State,\u201d said McDowell, a Frederick A. White Distinguished Professor of Professional Service.<\/p>\n

So McDowell flew to Los Angeles on June 12 and met with Hanks in a studio at Playtone, Hanks\u2019 production company in Santa Monica.<\/p>\n

McDowell presented Hanks with a professional album that included 15 to 20 photos of the time Hanks was at Wright State, including a selfie with students. The album also included a photo of the three current Tom Hanks Scholars and personal notes from them. Lastly, McDowell presented Hanks with an enormous kite of the Wright Flyer airplane McDowell had purchased at Carillon Park.<\/p>\n

\u201cI basically said, \u2018Hello from Wright State,\u2019\u201d said McDowell. \u201cHe remembered fondly the time he was there. He had a good time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hanks\u2019 first contact with Wright State came in 1978, when he was a young actor with the Great Lakes Shakespeare Festival in Cleveland. As part of a tour, Hanks performed at Wright State in Shakespeare\u2019s \u201cThe Two Gentlemen of Verona.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then Hanks went to New York City and, after about six months of being unemployed, auditioned for the Riverside Shakespeare Company of New York, which was founded in 1977 by McDowell and his now-wife, Gloria Skurski.<\/p>\n

\u201cHanks was cast by our director right off the street in the lead of Machiavelli\u2019s \u2018The Mandrake,\u2019 playing the role of Callimaco,\u201d McDowell recalled. \u201cHe was phenomenal. He had an incredible sense of improvisation and distinctive stage presence. He performed in a mask that he\u2019d sometimes take off and improvise patter with our audience.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a result of his role in the play in 1979, Hanks was able to secure an agent, who took him and his blossoming career to Hollywood. Hanks would land a part in the ABC sitcom \u201cBosom Buddies,” followed by his breakthrough comic role in \u201cSplash,\u201d directed by Ron Howard.<\/p>\n

It was during the filming of \u201cInferno,\u201d directed by Howard in Budapest, that McDowell approached Hanks to come to Wright State in the spring of 2016 and dedicate the Tom Hanks Center for Motion Pictures. The center features posters of Hanks in several of his screen triumphs, including \u201cApollo 13\u201d and \u201cSaving Private Ryan,\u201d as well as his Oscar-winning roles in \u201cPhiladelphia\u201d and \u201cForrest Gump.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Wright State Motion Pictures Program<\/a> features nationally recognized faculty and alumni who have won Emmys and other high honors. Students in the program receive hands-on experience in all aspects of filmmaking and complete a curriculum that is deeply embedded in the liberal arts and strongly rooted in motion pictures history, theory and criticism. The program also stresses the humanist values of movies \u2014 the potential for movies to make the world a better place by sharing the human experience, illustrating courage and showing what people have overcome.<\/p>\n

Tom Hanks Center for Motion Pictures features a production studio, editing suites, a multipurpose classroom, a digital animation lab and a \u201cgreen room\u201d that serves as a lounge as well as a think-tank for students to develop future film projects.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Tom Hanks at the dedication of the Tom Hanks Center for Motion Pictures at Wright State University on April 19, 2016.<\/p><\/div>\n

During McDowell\u2019s visit in Los Angeles, he spent nearly an hour interviewing Hanks about his memories of the Riverside Shakespeare Company. McDowell is writing a book about the first 10 years of the company. He has interviewed about a dozen people for the book, which is tentatively titled \u201cThen Came Each Actor,\u201d a line from \u201cHamlet.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor his audition for \u2018The Mandrake\u2019 back in 1979, Tom chose an unusual audition piece because he was trying to compete with 500 other Shakespearean actors. It was hilarious,\u201d said McDowell, adding that it featured a Monty Python spoof of Shakespeare.<\/p>\n

Hanks told McDowell during the interview that he credits \u201cThe Mandrake\u201d with giving him the freedom to talk directly to the audience and demonstrate his improvisational skills.<\/p>\n

\u201cTom reminisced about everything from cast parties to performance in front of audiences to improvisation,\u201d said McDowell. \u201cActors have better memories than most because they have to memorize large amounts of text. Hanks has that kind of memory; he gave me terrific material for the book I\u2019m writing.\u201d<\/p>\n

McDowell met Hanks two days later following an outdoor performance of Shakespeare\u2019s \u201cHenry IV Part I and II,\u201d in which Hanks played Falstaff, a whiskery swag-bellied cornucopia of appetites. The play was performed for the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles in an outdoor theater built and staffed by military veterans.<\/p>\n

Following the show, which Hanks did as a fundraiser for the center, McDowell and a number of people from the old Riverside Shakespeare Company met with him backstage.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe could not have been more generous with his time,\u201d said McDowell.<\/p>\n

McDowell said Hanks loves Shakespeare and throws himself into it. In Hanks\u2019 studio, Falstaff\u2019s lines are written on two giant blackboards, and Hanks rehearses them every day.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s obviously having the time of his life acting, so why does he go back and do Shakespeare?\u201d said McDowell. \u201cTom said, \u2018In movies you shoot these little tiny pieces, but when you do a play you do the full arc of a character. And that\u2019s so rich and so rewarding.’\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Stuart McDowell, artistic director of the Department of Theatre, Dance and Motion Pictures Tom Hanks for his book on the Riverside Shakespeare Company. Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":53162,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[722,2037,2023,4859,725,747,715],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academics","category-arts-scene","category-faculty","category-fine-and-performing-arts","category-home-news-sidebar","category-liberal-arts","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53157"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53157\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53166,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53157\/revisions\/53166"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}