Cat on Cars: Hanks is Electrifying

Tom Hanks is known for playing the good guy in many movies, and thanks to his devotion to electric vehicles, he just may turn out to be a good guy in real life too.

Known best for his Oscar winning roles in “Philadelphia”, “Forrest Gump” and a multitude of other favorites, the 52 year-old could easily afford a warehouse full of luxury and performance vehicles to rival the car collection of Jay Leno. However, the always affable Hanks has chosen to follow the road less traveled.

The actor is now driving his second all-electric vehicle and is also the proud owner of a hybrid SUV. Unlike the rest of us who are just discovering this save-the-planet attitude and car-conversion phenomenon, Hanks says this is nothing new for him. As he explained to David Letterman back in 2006, it has simply become part of his lifestyle.

“The greatest thing about driving an electric car, Dave, is that you never have to stop at a gas station again except when you really want a Big Gulp and some Slim Jims,” he told the Letterman audience.

But owning an all-electric vehicle, or converting an existing one to pure electric power, is not inexpensive. In fact, Hanks jokingly said that his first car was so expensive that they don’t event make them anymore.

His current all-electric car is a Scion xB (a US-only brand created by Toyota) which he had converted at great expense. His first electric car was also a Toyota which had about 30,000 miles on it. Both vehicles get approximately 80-110 miles per charge which, according to Hanks, gives him enough power to do all the driving around L.A. that he wants.

No offense to Scion owners, but this just isn’t the kind of car you’d expect to see a celebrity driving around town in. It’s bulky, boxy and, judging from the photos, an ugly kind of teal green - plus it was made as an entry level car for those still trying to figure out why we call them Generation Y. So “Y” did he pick it? Maybe since the conversion was going to be pricey, he wanted to keep his overall costs down.

But seriously, if you had Hanks’ kind of money, wouldn’t you at least go for something a little splashier, like say, a Maserati? Oh well, there’s no accounting for taste, I guess.

Clearly weight has something to do with it. According to Treehugger.com, if you want to get anywhere without draining your entire battery and getting stuck, you need a light car (about 2,000 - 3,000 lbs. curb weight) and a manual transmission. The new 2008 Maserati GranTurismo MC Concept, which weighs in just over 3,080 lbs., might just be a candidate after all.

Still, running out of battery in the middle of nowhere just doesn’t sound like much fun. But somehow the benefits outweigh all the hassles for Tom and his family. And it all makes sense for a guy who seems capable of so much and always looks like he can accomplish great things with ease. In fact, Hanks will become only the third American-born male actor in the past decade to be honored at the Film Society of Lincoln Center’s annual Gala Tribute in New York next April.

Hanks is also returning to the screen in Toy Story 3 (due out in 2010) and in Angels and Demons (in 2009) where he reprises his role as Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon in the movie version of the Dan Brown book that introduced the character who soon became a household name in The Da Vinci Code. The movie, being directed by Ron Howard, also features Ayelet Zurer and Ewan McGregor.

So even though we love Tom for being so electric, this is clearly one actor whose career isn’t running out of gas anytime soon.