Sentimentally we imagine that a popular artist must have hidden depths. Gossip has become the purest form of show biz, a story that can be as short as a gerbil joke or as epic as the Monica Follies. It attaches itself to any prominent person, no matter how conventional or innocent he may appear. Yet in all the annals of tattle, one man stands unsmeared. No one has accused Tom Hanks of being secretly gay, or of enjoying an unnatural relationship with certain varieties of fish, or of having sired a child in each NBA city.
Hanks is a bright, decent, nice guy.
In Saving Private Ryan, for which he may earn his third Oscar as the tough, paternal Captain Miller, Hanks has a moment when the burden of leadership in war has nearly broken him. He is discreet even in despair. And Hanks is a hero even when he does bad things. In the intimate anonymity of a chat room, he carries on an e-mail affair with Ryan and doesn't tell her that her destroyer is her potential beau. At a literary soiree he scoops up all the caviar.