The actor gave his 'The Post' co-star a hard time during his appearance on 'The Late Show' Tuesday.Tom Hanks stopped by The Late Show on Monday to promote his new film The Post, but ribbed his co-star Meryl Streep in the process.
After host Stephen Colbert explained to Hanks that many people trust him, including his co-star, Hanks playfully rolled his eyes. "You mean, can I just say, 'high maintenance Meryl Streep?'" the actor joked. "Oh really? Diva?" Colbert prodded.
"Look, the shoes alone, man," Hanks joked, adding, "No, I am so joking."
"You know what's scary about Meryl? She comes in and does it just like everybody else does. You're expecting French horns before she enters the stage," he explained.
The actor also told a story about how Streep was upset with him for not filling her in on a key part of working with the film's director, Steven Spielberg: "He doesn't rehearse. He just wants to figure it out as he goes along. He's almost like a guerilla filmmaker. He has the set, he has the space and he wants to fill it with something he hasn't imagined before. I don't mean to [say] that he's not prepared — he's the most prepared man in the world."
The film tells the story of The Washington Post's Ben Bradlee (Hanks) and Katharine Graham (Streep), and Graham's decision to publish the Pentagon Papers in 1971, at the risk of losing her family-owned newspaper.
Hanks also said that he met Bradlee for drinks, and shared the advice the journalist gave him about journalism: "You know, you gotta make sure if you're gonna put it on the front page of the paper, that you got it right. Because if it's wrong, you gotta eat it for the next 24 hours and it doesn't taste good."
During the show, Colbert and Hanks also debated Christmas decorations, including the merits of tinsel on a tree, and talked Hanks' new book, Uncommon Type: Some Stories.