Chet Hanks is stuck in Colombia and is asking the internet to help him get back into the US.
The model, actor and musician – the son of Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson – said in an Instagram video on Friday (February 27) that he flew to Puerto Rico for his “homie Max’s birthday” and decided to extend his trip by heading to Medellín in Colombia.
“I’m in Puerto Rico, and we’re all about to leave. I go, Hmm, I’m only, you know, two, three hours away from Medellín. Why don’t I go pull up on my homie Taylor, who lives in Medellín? Fuck it. Yeah, sounds good, right?” Hanks explained.
Hanks is a dual citizen of the US and Greece, being granted Greek citizenship in 2020 due to his parents’ work in raising awareness of the 2018 Attica wildfires. Because his US passport was about to expire when he left for Puerto Rico, he took his Greek passport with him – but when he got to the airport in Medellín he was told he’d need his US passport in order to get back into the country.
“They tell me that if I’m using a foreign passport, I need a green card to get back into America,” he said. “I don’t have a green card because I’m an American citizen. I don’t have my American passport with me, so I’m literally stuck in Colombia.”
He explained that the only embassy in the South American country where he could sort out the problem is in the capital Bogotá, some 260 miles away.
“I literally have no fucking idea what I’m gonna do…I don’t want to go to Bogotá, so, yeah, free me. You know what I’m saying: Free me,” he finished.
Since then, Hanks has been posting various updates from Colombia and appears to still be in the country. On Tuesday (March 3), he posted a video on his Instagram Stories in which he tagged the Clínica Antienvejecimiento wellness spa in the city.
The previous day, he posted a video in which he discussed the insomnia he’d been experiencing, his sobriety, and the recent arrest involving actor Shia LaBeouf in New Orleans.
Hanks, who has described himself as the “black sheep” of his family due to a handful of outspoken statements and public controversies over the years, began his career as an actor in the 2007 film Bratz, playing Dexter.
He then had a number of film roles in the early 2010s and appeared as Charlie on Shameless from 2016 to 2018 before roles in Empire, Greyhound – alongside his father – and Your Honor followed. He has also recorded a number of songs, both solo and as part of the duo Something Out West, formerly known as FTRZ.
In 2020, he went viral with bizarre videos of himself speaking in Jamaican Patois at the Golden Globes, while last year he teamed up with his dad to recreate Forrest Gump for a new Something Out West music video.