Austin Butler, who plays Elvis Presley, offers the best acting lesson he ever received from co-star Tom Hanks.

Austin Butler, who plays Elvis in Baz Luhrmann’s film, reveals that Tom Hanks provided him with the best piece of advice he has ever received in his career. Elvis, one of the most anticipated movies of the summer, will tell the story of Elvis Presley’s rise to fame and the rock and roll singer’s tumultuous relationship with his manager, Colonel Tom Parker. The film will also explore Elvis’s complicated relationship with his mother.

In addition to Kodi Smit-McPhee, Olivia DeJonge, and Dacre Montgomery, Tom Hanks, winner of an Academy Award, performs the role of Parker in the cast of ensemble actors. The fact that Luhrmann was involved with the film wasn’t made public until 2014, despite the fact that development on the film had begun many years before. However, Butler recently acknowledged how all-consuming it can be to take on a part of such magnitude in an interview with GQ. He also disclosed the beneficial bit of advise that his co-star Hanks given him.

After addressing Tom Hanks, Gerard Butler explained that his piece of advise to him was simply that he should read something every day that is completely unrelated to the topic that he is now working on. According to what Austin stated, Screenrant, “That gave me permission, as up until that point, I had only been reading anything and everything that had to do with Elvis. [Hanks’ advice was] “Every day I try to read something that has nothing to do with the job that I’m doing.” [This] gave me permission. Only Elvis Presley was playing on my headphones. It was Elvis’s influences as well as Elvis himself; there was no other factor involved.”

After having roles in The Carrie Diaries and Once Upon a Time in… Hollywood, Butler seemed to have broken through with his performance as Elvis. Butler had previously acknowledged the personal connection he had to the role: both he and Presley had lost their mothers when they were barely 23 years old, and Butler’s audition for the role involved him performing “Unchained Melody” as a homage to his mother.