Trivia / A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

• Ability over Appearance: Suffice to say, Tom Hanks resembles Fred Rogers about as much as a beagle resembles a tabby cat, yet it's more than apparent that he was cast not because of how much he resembles Rogers, but because he carries the role strongly enough to be a perfect fit for the part^note Go on. Find another living actor actually capable of playing the kindest man who ever lived. We'll wait.. (That said, Hanks and Rogers are actually sixth cousins from a German ancestor.) Rogers' widow, Joanne Byrd, said that Rogers would have been thrilled with the choice had he been alive to see it, because Forrest Gump was Rogers' favorite movie.
• Beam Me Up, Scotty!: A meta example occurs with the film's title, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. The original song from Mister Rogers' Neighborhood opens with the line "It's a beautiful day in this neighborhood."
• Billing Displacement: The movie is promoted as a look into Mister Rogers and Tom Hanks is prominent in all marketing material. The actual protagonist is Lloyd Vogel, played by Matthew Rhys, but he isn't given much focus outside of the film itself.
• California Doubling: The neighborhood surrounding Lloyd's Manhattan apartment was shot in Pittsburgh, which is given away by the presence of Fifth Avenue Place building and a waving Pennsylvania state flag in the background of certain shots.
• Descended Creator: Noah Harpster, the co-writer of the screenplay, also portrays Lloyd's newlywed brother-in-law.
• Fake American: Wales native Matthew Rhys as American Esquire reporter Lloyd Vogel.
• No Export for You: Defied and averted like hell; despite the film is based in a TV show which was never exported outside its native U.S. and some points of the film requires previous knowledge about Fred Rogers and his show, that haven't prevent the film from being shown overseas, and in some cases, with even a dub to boot.
• Playing Against Type: The Japanese dub is quite an interesting case: Mr. Rogers is voiced by Masashi Ebara, which is traditionally the regular dub voice of Tom Hanks in Japan. While Ebara normally dubs whatever Hanks plays in his films, regardless the kind of role, Ebara, for his part, while being a quite versatile voice actor by his own right, most of his roles goes between voicing either evil villains, stoic characters, the Butt-Monkey, guys with oversized egos, or any combination of those profiles, some of these include Bolt Crank, Might Guy, Dyma Goldwin and the current voice of Mr. Satan^note Which adds an extra layer of hilarity, since the real-life Mr. Rogers was a priest.. In this film, he dubs Fred Rogers, a person which was considered as Nice Guy (no pun intended) incarnated in Real Life.
• Working Title: Many early reports on the movie gave it the title You Are My Friend.

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