- All right, so you brought your son
to set with you while shooting, right?
- I always do.
My son's almost five and both of us, me and my husband,
are both directors, so he's kind of grown up going to sets,
and he gave little tips sometimes to Tom, like--
- Oh my, Tom Hanks (laughs)? - Yeah
Sometimes he was like,
"You know, I like what you're doing,
"I think you need a rocket ship".
(all laughing)
- Tom was like "Okay, great, great, what else, what else?
"Tell me what else".
- [Kelly] Oh my God!
- Yeah.
- Two directors, that's amazing.
- Yeah.
- That has got to be a fun relationship ma'am.
- It is, it means we understand each others work.
- [Kelly] That is cool.
- We know what the other one's going through.
- Really cool.
- Story time must be great for Wiley, like at night
- Yeah, I know.
- Story like "What did mum say last night?"
"Right, well, in my version".
- All the time.
Everything's a competition.
- Yeah, yeah.
- That is our household as well (laughs).
So how did this movie make you
reflect on your own life?
- Well I mean like you,
I grew up watching Mr. Rogers,
but I think the thing about Mr. Rogers,
is it's also, we watched it when we were so little.
It's almost like in our DNA.
It's like pre-memory.
So I feel like I got to rediscover Mr. Rogers
as a grownup and as a parent, you know?
- As a parent?
- It's a different thing
to look at the show now
and to see it through the eyes
of a grown person, and to recognize,
oh wow, he's talking about things
a lot of us still need to work on.
- I mean literally, my husband and I
sat and sobbed in our bedroom watching this film.
- I'm glad.
- Because he is very close to my heart
because I didn't grow up with a father,
so for a lot of us it's a father figure,
you know?
- I've had so many people say that to me,
that they almost actually believed
Mr. Rogers was their dad
when they were growing up. - Yes.
Or it was somebody that you wanted,
you thought that's what it should be like.
You know?
You did a really great job.
- Like Bill and Joanne,
Joanne Rogers, his wife
and Bill who was his right hand man for his whole life,
said something to me the other day
in Pittsburgh, where they said,
"You know, Fred didn't expect
"everybody to live in his image.
"He accepted us with all our imperfections.
"He knew we weren't perfect parents.
"He knew we weren't perfect people."
Like, something is freeing about recognizing
both that Fred was a human being,
he wasn't a saint,
and that he didn't expect us to be saints either.
He didn't shy away from the hard parts
of being alive and being a human being.
- And that was actually one of my favorite parts
in the film is where his wife
does say, "He has to work at this.
"This isn't like,--
- She said that to me.
- I know.
- That's in the movie because she said that to me.
- And that makes hope for all of us,
because I'm like, if you just come out
being awesome and lovely, well great,
that's easy for you.
But knowing he had to work at it,
we all have to work at it.
It takes effort.
- It's like to take time
to listen to other people and empathize with them,
takes more work.
- One funny thing I found about this though, is that
I heard Tom Hanks turned this role down a few times--
- He did.
- but then somehow you roped him in.
How did you rope him in and
can I know your secret?
(audience laughing)
- I'll never do anything so miraculous
again in my life.
The story is that, I'm friends with Tom Hanks' son Colin.
- Oh, okay.
- And Tom and I met
at a backyard birthday party
where all the kids where playing in the backyard.
And we were talking and he said,
"Oh, what do you do?"
and I said,
"Well, I'm a director".
And he said "Oh, there was just this article
"in the New York Times this weekend
"about women directors in Hollywood."
And I said, "Yeah, I'm in that article".
- How cool did you feel?
With Tom Hanks standing there
how cool did you feel, like
"Actually, I'm in the article.
"No big deal, Tom."
- No big deal, Tom Hanks.
And he said, "I'll watch your movie"
and a week later he personally emailed me
and said, "I watched your movie.
"Let's get together and chat."
And that the other thing about him,
is that he doesn't have like someone
reach out to you, like he reaches out to you and says.
- That's so cool.
So he must have loved your work.
- And then we kept in touch for years
and when I signed on to this movie,
the Producer said,
"Tom Hanks has always been our dream as Mr. Rogers
"but he's passed on the movie three times.
"He said no."
And I said, "Well I could try".
And I reached out to him and he (finger clicks)
signed on right away.
- [Kelly] You're magical.
You're magical!
(audience clapping)
- [Interviewee] And I'm just so grateful!
- [Kelly] He is perfect.
- [Interviewee] He is.
- The casting was perfect.
The directing was amazing.
- Everybody who worked on this movie
worked on it because they loved it.
And you could feel it. - It reads through the camera.
Yeah, you can feel it and it matters.
- It does matter.
You know I really believe you don't have to suffer
to make good art.
- Yes.
Oh I love you.