Hollywood star Tom Hanks took to Twitter on Wednesday to dismiss for one more time news that he was going to Athens to receive an award for being a friend of Greece, a philellene, for having made a generous donation to an archaeological site or whatever the rumors and a society called the Hellenic Institute of Cultural Development claimed in the last couple of days.
“To my friends in Greece. Someone is claiming that I am appearing at an event in Athens which is not and has never been true. Tickets are being sold with the promise of my presence,” Tom Hanks tweeted to his 15.3 million followers and continued in a thread.
For the record, there is no such entity called Tom Hanks Management and any signature of mine on a contract claiming an agreement is a forgery. @USEmbassyAthens @SNForg @HICDUK @Kathimerini_gr @hicd2017 pic.twitter.com/sHkl39SvMZ
— Tom Hanks (@tomhanks) October 4, 2018
Two days ealrier, his wife Rita Wilson had also dismissed the Greek media news that Tom Hands would attend the event at the Stavros Nirachos Foundation on October 6 in order to get an award.
After the Hollywood star himself dismissed as “untrue” the whole issue, the Institute and the Niarchos Foundation thought it was time to take position to it.
The Stavros Niarchos Culturla Center descibed the event as a “hoax.”
As the SNFCC stated earlier (read at https://t.co/mUkH6NVZz5), the news of Mr. Tom Hanks being awarded by the SNFCC is a hoax. The #SNF created the SNFCC and, upon its completion, donated it to the Greek State. The SNF continues to support the SNFCC through grants. #RitaWilson
— ΙΣΝ | SNF (@SNForg) October 2, 2018
The Hellenic Institute of Cultural Diplomacy, the organizer of the event, said in a statement that the institute and the Greek authorities investigate whether a leading member of the society fell victim of a fraudster who pretended to act in the name of Tom Hanks.
“On the reports concerning the arrival of Mr Hanks in Athens as a guest of ε.ι.π.δ for charity we declare:
Entry to the event was announced to be free and not on money as wrongly published.
On the initiative of the ε.ι.π.δ, an investigation is carried out with the Greek authorities to determine whether the agency, and in particular its representative, Mrs Ada Ēliopoúlou, has been a victim of deception by Mr Hanks’s alleged representative, as well as whether the documents that the agency has at its Or not, the Institute said in a statement.
