Tom Hanks Revealed He Almost Died While Filming This Movie: ‘We Had to Shut Down for 3 Weeks’
Tom Hanks delivered an amazing performance as Chuck Noland in the 2000 movie Cast Away, picking up a Golden Globe award for best actor. The role proved to be demanding for the actor — and he even had a near-death experience while filming.
Tom Hanks said he almost died while making ‘Cast Away’
Hanks revealed in a 2009 interview with BBC’s Radio 1 that his time working on the film resulted in a leg injury that required a hospital stay. Hanks got an infection from a cut on his leg and, while he initially thought that it was no big deal, he was hospitalized for a serious infection.
“[Cast Away] put me in the hospital. I was there for three days with something that, believe it or not, almost killed me,” he explained (via Digital Spy).
He continued, “I got an infection from a cut and it was eating its way through my leg. I didn’t know it, I just thought I had a sore. I went to the doctor who took one look and said, ‘I have to put you in the hospital because we have to get this infection out of you before it poisons your blood and you die.'”
“We had to shut down for three weeks while my skin reformed,” he added.
Thankfully, Hanks received treatment and recovered from the health scare.
Tom Hanks survived coronavirus
In 2020, Hanks and his wife Rita Wilson tested positive for coronavirus (COVID-19) and, when interviewed by The Guardian for an interview published July 10, 2020, Hanks revealed how their symptoms differed.
“Oh no, we’re fine,” he said, when asked if they had any long-lasting effects from coronavirus. “Our discomfort because of the virus was pretty much done in two weeks and we had very different reactions, and that was odd.”
He continued, “My wife lost her sense of taste and smell, she had severe nausea, she had a much higher fever than I did. I just had crippling body aches, I was very fatigued all the time and I couldn’t concentrate on anything for more than about 12 minutes.”
He joked, “That last bit is kinda like my natural state anyway.”
Hanks praised his family after winning a prestigious award
At the 2020 Golden Globes, Hanks received the Cecil B. DeMille Award for “outstanding contributions” to entertainment.
During his his acceptance speech, Hanks got choked up about his family.
“A man is blessed with a family sitting down front like that — a wife who is fantastic in every way, who has taught me what love is … five kids who are braver and stronger and wiser than their old man is.”
“And a loving group of people who have put away with me being away months and months at a time,” he added. “Of course, otherwise I wouldn’t be standing here if they didn’t have to put up with that. I can’t tell you how much your love means to me.”
