Improvising

You found yourself standing there in the hotel lobby waiting for Tom Hiddleston himself. Your friend, who was supposed to do the interview, got sick and for that reason couldn’t do the interview. So you had gotten called in just over an hour ago, and had no time to prepare. You trusted your friend to have everything ready for the interview, but as you stood there, skimming through the questions, your heart nearly stopped. Was this some sort of a joke? You couldn’t possibly ask him about those kinds of things without sinking through the floor in shame. With a rousing sense of panic, you went through the papers, trying to find the real questions or anything of substance, but you ended up empty handed. You almost felt like crying as you glanced down at your watch, realising that there was only five minutes left until your scheduled meeting. You rummaged through your purse for a pen and a paper and was just about to start writing new questions when the subject of the interview suddenly appeared in the lobby.

“Umm, excuse me mister Hiddleston, are you here for the interview? I mean, of course you are…” you greeted him nervously as he approached you with a warm smile.

“Hi, you must be Riley. Please, feel free to call me Tom,” Tom replied as he shook your hand.

“Actually, Riley is sick, so I’m standing in for her,” you informed him with a shy smile.

“Ah, I see. What’s your name then?” Tom asked with interest as he still held your hand in his.

“[Your name],” you replied.

“Nice to meet you, [your name],” Tom said with a smile

“It’s very nice to meet you too, Tom,” you replied blushingly, feeling a bit strange as you spoke his name so familiarly. “This way,” you added and led him to the room in which the interview was to be held. You both sat down on the chairs in front of the camera as soon as Tom had politely introduced himself to the man behind the camera and the man in control of the microphone hovering over your heads just out of line of sight for the camera.

“Are you ready?” the cameraman asked to which Tom answered ‘yes’ and you answered a truthful ‘not really’.

“I’m sorry,” you apologised flusteredly. “I’m ready.”

“Camera rolling,” the cameraman announced and you could feel yourself grow pale. You nervously glanced down at the papers, but quickly looked away as you struggled not to grimace at the questions on there.

“I’m sitting here with Tom Hiddleston. Welcome to the R and R show, Tom,” you said, grateful that you at least got the name of the show right. At least that was something.

“Thanks for having me,” Tom replied politely.

“The pleasure is all ours,” you said with a smile. “So, Tom… I personally think you really did a great job portraying Hank Williams in I Saw the Light.”

“Thank you, I really appreciate it,” Tom said and smiled at you. You couldn’t help but get caught up in his beautiful blue eyes as he looked at you.

“Um… One thing I found particularly interesting in the movie was the moment when Hank said that everybody has a little darkness inside of them, that he showed it to them and they heard it, but they didn’t have to take it home with them. I was wondering if you would like to elaborate what you think Hank Williams’s darkness consisted of,” you said as you mentally cursed your friend for not having come up with better questions herself so you wouldn’t have to improvise like this.

“Interesting question,” Tom commended and touched his chin thoughtfully before answering. “Ehm, as is well-known, Hank struggled with alcohol and drug addiction, and I suppose you could say that it’s a way of how the darkness portrayed itself. But what exactly this darkness consisted of is difficult to say. In the scene you’re referring to, Hank mentions anger, sorrow and shame. But I think it’s more complicated than just that when it comes to Hank. I think there was something in him that was addicted to the darkness and that it somehow felt more real to him than anything else. I think part of his darkness was his very addiction to it. Do I make any sense?”

“I think so…” you replied and decided to elaborate. “The attraction to the darkness itself was part of his darkness. His unwillingness to let go of it made it darker… Like staying in a dark corner of a room instead of coming out into the light.”

“Exactly,” Tom agreed and his face lit up as he looked at you. “It was like Hank felt more comfortable in his dark corner than out in the light. And I think as he went into the vortex of addiction, into the darkness, he couldn’t stay sober for long enough to see clearly, to come out into the light and see how many people actually cared about him.”

“That’s tragic,” was your instinctive response.

“It is,” Tom agreed.

“Hank Williams isn’t the only character with darkness inside of him that you’ve played… I think you could say that Adam in Only Lovers Left Alive had a bit of darkness inside of him as well. Ehm… would you say that there are any similarities between Adam and Hank?” you asked, trying not to grimace at how far fetched your question felt.

“Interesting question,” Tom said again, causing you to blush. It made you glad to hear that he found your questions interesting, seeing as you got them at the top of your head. “Well, while Adam is obviously fictional and a vampire, I think there are similarities between him and Hank. They are both musicians,” he said grabbing his index finger as he began to count the similarities between the two characters. “They both have a darkness inside of them, like you said yourself,” he told you and grabbed his long finger as well. “They both seem lonely even though they have people around them who care…” he said and grabbed a third finger. “There are probably more things they have in common…”

“Well, how about the differences between Adam and Hank?” you asked.

“Adam is fictional whereas Hank is real. Adam’s a vampire and Hank is human. While Adam had a long life, Hank’s life was tragically short. He died of heart failure at only twenty nine years of age. He was one of those stars that shine brightly but burn out quickly, while Adam is more of a slow burning star,” Tom replied and you found yourself nodding in agreement at his answers.

“Yes… Another character with a long lifespan is the god of mischief himself. Loki. I heard you were working on a Loki TV show, is there anything you could tell us about that?” you asked curiously.

“Well, the series starts right after Loki grabs the tesseract in Avengers: Endgame. It’ll be six hours of air time and it will be released on Disney plus in 2021. Sorry I can’t tell you much more than that at this point,” Tom said.

“That’s alright. So we have six more hours of Loki to look forward to, that’s great. How did you feel about revisiting the part? You’ve been playing him for quite some years now,” you wondered.

“I’ve been playing him for ten years now and I really enjoyed revisiting the role as Loki. I feel like I know this character now, and the audience knows him. The most exciting aspect of playing him is to present him with new challenges, which change him in different ways,” Tom replied, seemingly happy to talk about Loki.

The cameraman motioned for you to wrap up the interview, leaving you disappointed that your meeting with Tom was already coming to an end.

“I really look forward to seeing what new challenges Loki’s up against. Unfortunately it seems our time is up. Thank you so much Tom Hiddleston for coming here and joining us on the R and R show,” you said, genuinely grateful to actually meet him in person.

“Thanks for having me,” Tom told you, his smile making your heart skip a beat.

“Cut,” said the cameraman.

“Thank you for saving me with your interesting answers,” you told Tom once the camera was off.

“Saving you?” he asked surprisedly. “I hardly think you needed saving, you did great with the questions,” he commended.

“You really think so?” you said, feeling relieved as he nodded his head ‘yes’ in response. “Thank you. I was not at all prepared for this, so I had to improvise,” you admitted.

“You improvised? Then you’re a natural at this,” he praised, seemingly impressed. “Didn’t your friend prepare the questions?"

"In all honesty, her questions were not up to standard. Some were downright dreadful,” you said truthfully.

“Really? Dreadful you say?” he asked interestedly. “Would you let me see her questions?” Tom requested curiously and you reluctantly handed them over to him while blushing, as though you were somehow responsible for them.

“Oh,” he uttered understandingly as he skimmed through the questions about James Bond, Taylor Swift, what type of women he preferred and if he was feeling lonely now that he was single. “Thank you for not asking me about all this,” he said with relief and kept reading the questions, grimacing at some and laughing at others.

“If your friend was seriously going to ask me those questions, I’m almost glad she was sick,” Tom said jokingly, causing you to laugh. “It not just because I wish to avoid another awkward interview, but because it was a real delight to be interviewed by you."

"Oh, thank you,” you said feeling flattered. “I found it really nice talking to you too."

“I still have some time left before my next interview, if you would like to grab a cup of coffee,” Tom offered.

“I would love to,” you answered, barely able to contain your excitement.

You continued talking to each other about different kinds of things. This time it was almost as though he was interviewing you, asking about your life. When he found out that you had a vlog where you posted song covers his face lit up.

"I’ll make sure to check it out,” he promised and pulled out his phone to write down the name of your vlog.

When it was time to finally part, Tom added, “feel free to contact me if you want to grab another coffee or something. It was really nice talking to you, [your name].” He handed you a piece of paper with what appeared to be his phone number on it before leaving. You stood there dumbfounded for a moment. Then you smiled to yourself thinking that sometimes improvising really pays off. You had never expected that you would be so glad that your friend had come down with a cold.