NASA LANGLEY ENGINEER CONNECTS WORK WITH HISTORY IN ‘FIRST MAN’
Bill Tomek was born a few months after the fire that killed three astronauts aboard Apollo 1. He is too young to remember the Apollo 11 moon landing, though he did once meet Neil Armstrong at a college football game.
But last year, the engineer from NASA Langley Research Center got an up-close look at the events and names that have fascinated him his entire life — when he landed a small speaking role in “First Man,” the movie biography of Armstrong.
The film does not reference the critical training Armstrong did at NASA Langley in preparation for the moon landing, but the historic facility is well represented just the same. In addition to Tomek’s appearance — playing the pad leader and test conductor for Apollo 1 — the screenplay was adapted from a biography written by former NASA Langley historian James Hansen.
“I always idolized Neil Armstrong,” Tomek said. “When I was in seventh grade, we had to do book reports on a biography of someone famous. Everyone else was doing people like Abraham Lincoln or Thomas Jefferson, but I selected Neil Armstrong. My dad was a pilot, and from a young age I was always interested in anything having to do with the space program.”
Tomek once crossed paths with Armstrong in the parking lot outside a football game at Purdue University, their shared alma mater. Tomek was arriving late. Armstrong, who was being honored before kickoff, was just leaving. Their conversation was brief but memorable for Tomek.
“How often do you get to meet your idol?” he said. “He was there by himself, no entourage, and I went up and shook his hand. I was in awe.”
For his role in “First Man,” Tomek does not interact with Ryan Gosling, who plays Armstrong. Instead, he plays North American Aviation employee Donald Babbitt, who was the pad leader and test conductor for the ill-fated Apollo 1 mission on which Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee died in a cap- sule fire during a launch rehearsal.
Tomek, 51, has worked at NASA Langley since 1990 and is currently involved with the development of launch vehicles and supersonic flight. A movie buff, in recent years he began finding work as a non-speaking extra in motion pictures.
That’s what he figured he would get when he applied with the casting agency handling “First Man” — a nameless part in the background of scenes. Perhaps, he figured, his job as an aerospace engineer with NASA would carry some weight with the casting director.
Much to his surprise, he was offered his first speaking role. In playing Babbitt, Tomek spent two 18-hour days on the movie set in Atlanta. While the actors portraying the Apollo 1 crew — Shea Whigham, Jason Clark and Cory Michael Smith — acted out their scene in a cramped re-creation of the command module, Tomek stood nearby giving instructions (“Apollo 1, this is Houston, you are go”). He said it required more than a dozen takes for director Damien Chazelle to get all of the necessary angles.
“These three actors were prone on their backs for six or seven hours before it was finally time for me to do my part,” Tomek said. “It was probably 4 or 5 in the morning, and I started to get a little nervous. I didn’t want to mess up and make these guys more uncom-
fortable in their seats in the cockpit. Knock on wood, I don’t think I messed up my lines at all.”
The film leaves out the training that Armstrong did at the Langley facility in Hampton — including simulated lunar landings at the iconic gantry that were so realistic Armstrong would later describe his actual touchdown on the moon by saying it was “just like Langley.”
Some famous Langley alums are depicted in the film — in particular,
Robert Gilruth and Chris Kraft, two key figures in the transition from the original National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics to NASA and the space program.
The film has its origins in Hansen’s book of the same name, which was published in 2005.
The author has a long affiliation with Langley dating back to 1981 and has written two books detailing the facility’s history.
He said it took him two years to get permission from the private, taciturn Armstrong — and he credits a NASA Langley connection for sealing the deal. It was during a conversation at Armstrong’s home in Cincinnati that Hansen mentioned his friendship with (and admiration for) former
NASA Langley test pilot Jack Reeder.
“As soon as I mentioned him, Neil lit up,” Hansen said. “His wife was in the room at the time, and Neil turned to her and said, ‘Jack Reeder was the best test pilot I ever knew.’ I didn’t know that they had known each other, but for me to emphasize what I had learned from Jack Reeder, and how important that was, that may have cemented my chances.”
At one point, Clint Eastwood had purchased the screen rights to Hansen’s book, but he never made the film. When Chazelle picked up the project, with Universal Pictures and DreamWorks, he brought in Academy Award-winning screenwriter Josh Singer to adapt the biography.
Chazelle asked Hansen to serve as a co-producer on the film, and he was on set almost every day during the filming to look over the screenplay for accuracy and consistency.
“I would say I ended up giving them more than
500 pages of comments over the course of the project,” Hansen said.
“I felt such a responsibility to Armstrong to keep things as real as possible. I have read that some authors, mostly fiction authors, think the best thing to do is to go up to the Hollywood sign, throw their book over the Hollywood sign and then race to the bank to cash the check. I couldn’t do that.
“Because of the responsibility I felt for Neil, I tried to stay involved, and I probably proved myself to be a nuisance to some of the other producers.”
Hansen said he had many “heated conversations” with Singer about details and dialogue, but said their exchanges were always respectful. In the battle between historical accuracy and dramatic license, he said he “probably batted .500.”
He said he has seen the film close to a dozen times already, and he is more than satisfied with how it came out and how his input was received.
“I can truly say that there are things in the film that would have been very different if I hadn’t commented, or if they hadn’t asked me questions,” Hansen said.
He is disappointed that no reference to Langley made it into the film, but as a lifelong movie lover he understands the necessity of condensing events and timelines even in the most accurate of film biographies.
“It’s too bad, but this is a very select story,” Hansen said. “It’s such a personal story of Armstrong’s journey, but it’s not a comprehensive story of his path to the moon. I’m working on a documentary for National Geographic that will get much more into Langley’s role.” Holtzclaw can be reached by phone at 757-928-6479.
“How often do you get to meet your idol? He was there by himself, no entourage, and I went up and shook his hand. I was in awe.”
Bill Tomek on Neil Armstrong