Sydney (AFP)
American actor Tom Hanks, cured of the new coronavirus, addressed a comforting letter to a young Australian, Corona, victim of harassment because of his first name and offered him a typewriter of the homonymous brand.
Tom Hanks and his wife, actress and singer Rita Wilson, announced in March that they had both contracted the new coronavirus while in Australia for filming.
The couple had been admitted to a Queensland hospital for two weeks before returning to the United States.
Corona De Vries, 8, had sent a letter to Tom Hanks to inquire about his health, media reports said.
"I heard on the news that you and your wife contracted the coronavirus," the boy wrote to them, before inquiring about their state of health.
"I like my name but at school people call me the coronavirus," the boy said in his letter, Australian news channel 7 News reported.
"I'm very sad and angry when people call me that," he told the Hollywood star.
Tom Hanks would have answered him with comforting words, typed on one of the typewriters that he often takes with him.
"Your letter made my heart warm to my wife and me," wrote the actor in the film "You have a message".
"I'm your friend," said Tom Hanks, who gave him a Corona typewriter he brought back from Australia.
"I thought this typewriter would suit you."
"Ask an adult how it works," he advises, before inviting Corona to "use it to answer him".
© 2020 AFP