Hanks plays the cherished US children’s TV star Fred Rogers in this surprisingly moving drama about his transformative encounter with a hardbitten reporter
Has anyone in
Britain ever heard of Fred Rogers? He was an
American children’s TV presenter whose folksy show for toddlers, Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, ran from 1968 to 2001 and made him a national treasure in the US, much admired for the way he encouraged children (and adults) to talk and think about their feelings. But unlike Sesame Street, it was not shown in the
UK and so Rogers, played here with extraordinary Zen self-possession and force by Tom Hanks, may be unfamiliar. The equivalent would be showing Americans a biopic of Blue Peter’s John Noakes. (To cast this imaginary Bafta-winner, I suggest Jamie Bell as Noakes, Erin Doherty as Valerie Singleton, Daniel Radcliffe as Peter Purves and
Meryl Streep as Biddy Baxter.