Over the years, Ratliff rebuilt his crumbled confidence and kept trying, becoming an improv star with the Upright Citizens Brigade in New York. He tallied countless small roles in commercials and movies while also landing prominent, scene-stealing parts on TV shows such as Search Party, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and Orange Is the New Black.
He made it. He’s a working actor. And that, along with the passage of two decades, is what has softened a painful moment into something he, and others, can actually laugh about.
The Dead Eyes podcast uses the Hanks firing as a framework, but many episodes are about other people’s cringeworthy tales of ego obliteration. Mad Men star Jon Hamm shared a story about an executive who told his agents point-blank that he lacked what it took to be a successful TV actor. Lost cocreator Damon Lindelof delved into his memories of the backlash to that show’s finale. Nicole Byer, Elijah Wood, Seth Rogen, 40-Year-Old Virgin filmmaker Judd Apatow, and Last Jedi writer-director Rian Johnson have all turned up to commiserate with their own tales of epic rejection and public face-planting.
Even Hanks has one to share.
As part of a preview for the upcoming 31st episode, Ratliff offered this story in which Hanks talks about getting kicked out of a screening room by Big director Penny Marshall. The reason: She wanted to spare his feelings as they reviewed footage of him. That was a courtesy not extended to Ratliff later on Band of Brothers.
“I had seen the screen tests. I had seen the wardrobe tests. So I thought I would be watching the daily rushes. And Penny made a beeline to me in the theater,” Hanks tells Ratliff. “‘You can’t be here,’ she says. ‘You don’t get to watch dailies.’”
When he protested, she got even more blunt about why he was unwelcome: “She said, ‘You don’t get to see dailies because in this room we have to talk uncensored. We are going to say terrible things about you. And the lighting. And the props. And the dolly moves. And you! ‘That line is not the line.’ ‘That is a horrible thing.’ ‘I hate this take, I’m not gonna use it.’ ‘His hair looks stupid.’ ‘Why does he have those folds in his neck?’ ‘Why is his voice so squeaky?’ We have to say all these things. And if you’re here to hear them, it’s really going to screw you up.’”
Unfortunately for Ratliff, he got to hear some of that unfiltered talk. And it did screw him up. It was worse than simply not getting a job; this was an example of actually succeeding, then having it yanked away. “You don’t wanna kill the part of yourself that enjoys looking forward to things, and for a while that was a thing that did feel diminished in me,” Ratliff tells Vanity Fair. “I was like, Nothing’s going to work out for me. You get into a mindset where you’re afraid to look forward to something, because what if it’s a mirage that’s going to vanish?”
Now that he has landed the ultimate interview—Hanks himself—what will become of Ratliff’s “Tom Hanks rejected me” podcast? Ratliff says this isn’t the end.
“One of the nicest compliments that people have paid is, early on in the first season, people started saying, ‘I hope you never get to Tom Hanks because I don’t want the podcast to end,’” Ratliff says. “I think if we continue on, it’ll be different. The Band of Brothers ‘dead eyes’ story will be less of a mystery and more of an origin story.”
To hear where it all began, listen to the very first episode below.
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