Tom Hanks Tribute: Actor Posts Touching Message On Twitter To The Late Robert Loggia
Last Friday, the world lost Robert Loggia, a great actor who starred in several blockbuster films such as Scarface, Prizzi’s Honor, and Big, with Tom Hanks. As reported by Entertainment Weekly, Hanks recently paid tribute to his late Big costar and the actor posted the following touching message on Twitter.
“Farewell, Robert Loggia. A great actor in heart and soul,” Hanks wrote. “A sad day. Hanx.”
Farewell, Robert Loggia. A great actor in heart and soul … A sad day. Hanx
— Tom Hanks (@tomhanks) December 5, 2015
Robert Loggia died at 85 years old. According to Gossip Cop, he passed away at his home in the Brentwood neighborhood of Los Angeles after a five-year battle with Alzheimer’s Disease.
Many celebrities took to social media to pay tribute to the Italian actor, including his other Big co-star, Elizabeth Perkins, who tweeted the following words.
“Rest peacefully kind, gentle, affectionate Robert Loggia,” the 55-year-old actress wrote. “One of the loveliest people I’ve ever known.”
Rest peacefully kind, gentle, affectionate Robert Loggia. One of the loveliest people I've ever known. ??@tomhanks pic.twitter.com/ztxa5Npa5z
— Elizabeth Perkins (@Elizbethperkins) December 5, 2015
The photograph of Perkins corresponds to one of the most memorable scenes of the 1988 film Big,which is about a young boy who makes a wish “to be big” and is then aged to adulthood overnight. The scene, in which Hanks and Loggia dance on a giant keyboard, is regarded as one of the most famous film scenes of all time.
Other figures from the world of cinema, such as Seth MacFarlane, Kevin Spacey and Roland Emmerich, also remembered Loggia through social media networks.
The great Robert Loggia has passed. My heart feels heavy with sadness but also gratitude that I was fortunate enough to know him.
— Roland Emmerich (@rolandemmerich) December 4, 2015
Sad to hear Robert Loggia passed. Rarely does someone love this craft as much as he did to give us 6 decades of work #shrink K?
— Kevin Spacey (@KevinSpacey) December 5, 2015
I was so deeply saddened to learn that Robert Loggia has passed. We used to golf together often at our club. A true gentleman. May he #RIP.
— James Woods (@RealJamesWoods) December 5, 2015
Loggia worked tirelessly, decade after decade, accumulating more than 200 appearances in TV series and movies in which he played all kinds of characters. Salvatore (Robert) Loggia was one of those character actors that everyone wanted to work with, and he even became an Academy Award nominee for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of private detective Sam Ransom in the 1985 thriller Jagged Edge.
In 2010, Loggia was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and he started gradually withdrawing from public life because of his suffering from the disease, which is a type of dementia that causes problems with memory, thinking and behavior.
For over four decades, Loggia participated in all kinds of movies, and his film roles included Revenge of the Pink Panther (1978), An Officer and a Gentleman (1982), Mercy Mission: The Rescue of Flight 771 (1983), Psycho II (1983), Armed and Dangerous (1986), Scarface (1983), Prizzi’s Honor (1985), Over The Top (1987), Necessary Roughness (1991), Independence Day (1996), and Return to Me (2000).
It can be said that Loggia’s most memorable role was in Big, in which he won a Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor. Loggia played the character Mr. MacMillan, a kindly toy company owner who dances with Hanks character on the iconic piano keyboard on the floor at F.A.O. Schwarz.
IMDB wrote that according to Loggia, on the day they filmed the scene, he and Tom Hanks noticed that doubles dressed like them were on hand just in case the two could not do the dance moves correctly. It became their goal to do the entire keyboard number without the aid of the doubles. They succeeded.
[Image via Randy Shropshire/Getty Images Entertainment]
