Here are Hanks recollections, as told to EWs Anthony Breznican ….
The thing about Jonathan was that he ran movies independent of all the pressures of making movies.
But everybody was invited into a process.
Credit: Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images; Vittorio Zunino Celotto/Getty Images
Look at the kind of career this guy had.
I imagine those were just big, fun-ass parties.
I rememberSomething Wildwas a fantastic movie,Married to the Mob, then of courseSilence of the Lambs.
Everett Collection
I think I had been in the audience whenSilence of the Lambswon best picture in 1992.
But I had never met him.
He was a mystery to me.
You werent getting a particular kind of genre with him.
There wasnt any such thing as a Jonathan Demme movie, per se.
He was not just, Hey, Im a renegade and I break all the rules.
You get AIDS and you die?
He said, Whatever.
Well hold our own.
We will actually be an investment from the craft/commercial point of view.
You will make money.
You get into the realm of insurance and stuff like that.
But Jonathan wanted him, and he fought for him.
There were a lot of people inPhiladelphiawho had AIDS and they were scattered throughout.
Some of them played people with AIDS and some of them played people who did not have AIDS.
Ron Vawter was certainly the biggest part of that.
Dont be afraid of this guy with AIDS.
Dont be afraid of this issue.
Dont be afraid of gay people.
