“I didn’t want to be the weak link”: Tom Hiddleston Was Almost Driven to Tears While Working With Steven Spielberg Before His Loki Fame

Veteran filmmaker Steven Spielberg has a knack for bringing people to tears, be it from his star-studded masterpieces of work like Schindler’s List or simply by his words. Surprisingly enough, one of his victims was none other than the iconic Loki portraying Hollywood heartthrob in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Tom Hiddleston.

This was way before Hiddleston had even joined the MCU in his fan-favorite role, back in 2010. And the way he was almost driven to tears was just through a conversation with the Indiana Jones director where the Hollywood mogul offered him a role in one of his best movies to date: Spielberg’s 2011 war/action film, War Horse.

The Time Steven Spielberg Brought Tom Hiddleston to Tears

As sweet a person as he is in real life, Hiddleston was almost pulled to tears easily as well, and all it took was the approval of mogul Steven Spielberg. This happened in 2010 when the actor had already made his name but was still navigating through Hollywood to find that breakthrough success to become a household name in the industry.

At that time, the Thor actor got a call from his agent claiming Spielberg “wanted to meet me,” as he shared with HuffPost. And since Hiddleston grew up as a fan of the mastermind filmmaker, he couldn’t believe it and “thought it had to be a joke.“ As he shared his reaction to the same: “I’ll never forget it – time slowed down.”

But what actually moved him to the core was when the Jurassic Park director abruptly told him he was cast in his movie War Horse. Recalling how he was talking to Spielberg’s assistant about Guinness when the filmmaker walked in to share the conversation, Tom Hiddleston told HuffPost:

There we were talking about Guinness, then the First World War, my family and stuff. Quite suddenly after about an hour, he said, ‘I’d like you to do it.’ I was stunned – I had to ask him to repeat it.

During another interview with the Independent, the Only Lovers Left Alive actor further elaborated on his reaction, saying:

I nearly whooped, wept, laughed and cried.

Needless to say, this was indeed a huge chance for Hiddleston and he didn’t want to mess it up in any way. And neither did he end up anywhere even close to messing it up considering all the “pressure” he put on himself for the same!

Tom Hiddleston Didn’t Want to Disappoint Steven Spielberg in Any Way

Since he finally scored the opportunity to work with his icon whose movies he had pretty much grown up watching, Hiddleston didn’t want to take any chance with his work. If anything, it seems like it was his topmost priority to keep Spielberg happy with him by being able to do whatever Spielberg asks of him.

Sharing how he had watched Steven Spielberg’s Raiders of the Lost Ark “when I was eight,” Hiddleston continued to share in his interview with HuffPost:

The pressure I put on myself to get it right… I wanted to be ready for anything he threw at me. I wanted him to be able to ask, ‘Tom, I want you to lead a charge of 120 horses…’

Continuing, he further expressed:

I didn’t want to be the weak link, a problem person, but because everybody is feeling like that, there probably are no problem people.

Well, for one thing, Hiddleston was anything but a weak link, considering how he absolutely nailed it while performing as Captain James Nicholls in the $66 million movie that went on to make a whopping $177.58 million at global box offices (via Box Office Mojo).

You can watch War Horse on Prime Video.