Tom Hanks jokes he’d ‘clean the toilet’ just to fly to space

TOM Hanks would clean the toilets just to make it to space.

The Hollywood actor previously turned down Amazon co-founder Jeff Bezos' offer to board his Blue Origin flight before Star Trek star William Shatner accepted the invitation. Still, he didn't want to hand over a staggering $28 million (about R525m) to take part.

Now, Hanks has confessed he'd do anything to make it into outer space.

He told The Daily Telegraph: “I'd like to be the guy in charge of serving food and making jokes to and from the moon.

“If there was room, I'd be the guy that cleans up, makes jokes, tells stories and keeps everybody entertained. I'm your man. I'd probably sign up right now.

“That might be a good idea. I'll do all the work. I'll clean the toilet. I'll serve the food. I'll fold the clothes. I'll stow the gear. That way the others could be free to do other stuff.”

On the day man first set foot on the Moon, Hanks, 13 at the time, said: “I walked around on July 20, 1969, very cognisant I was alive at a time when the history of humankind shifted.

“We were now the generation that was alive when we landed a man on the moon. I felt that same way about going to the moon as people did about building the Brooklyn Bridge or the Lindbergh flight.”

Asked on Jimmy Kimmel Live! if it was true he'd been asked to be on the flight before Shatner, Hanks said: “Well, yeah, provided I pay. You know, it costs like 28 million bucks or something like that. I'm doing good, Jimmy, I'm doing good. But I ain't paying 28 [million] bucks.”

Shatner, then 90, became the oldest person to travel to space when he and three other crew members took the New Shepard rocket on its NS-18 mission in October 2020, three months after Bezos travelled in the same rocket for his Blue Origin company's first space flight with humans on board.

Reuters Tom Hanks.