Behind the Scenes with Tom Hanks
b'Tom Hanks has been a constant presence on the American movie screen for forty years. He has played a mermaid\\u2019s boyfriend, an astronaut, a soldier on D Day, an F.B.I. agent, an AIDS patient, a castaway, and a strange, innocent character running across America\\u2014among dozens of other roles. Hanks won the Academy Award for Best Actor two years in a row. Now in his sixties, Hanks has added another line to his r\\xe9sum\\xe9: novelist. \\u201cThe Making of Another Major Motion Picture Masterpiece\\u201d\\u2014an overstuffed, often funny, work of fiction\\u2014captures what he\\u2019s learned from forty years in the business. Hanks describes the process of moviemaking as equal parts chaos and monotony. \\u201cIf anybody who we call a noncombatant, or a civilian, wants to visit the making of a motion picture, they will be bored out of their skull,\\u201d he tells David Remnick, insisting that it\\u2019s impossible to know on set whether a production will be a masterpiece or a flop. \\u201cYou do not know if it is going to work out. You can only have faith.\\u201d\\xa0\\xa0\\nHanks spoke with Remnick onstage at Symphony Space as part of The New Yorker Live to kick off his book tour.'