Tom Hiddleston is playing Hank Williams thanks to this ridiculous celeb impression

If you didn’t know, now you do: Tom Hiddleston is amazing at doing impressions. So much so in fact that an impression the U.K.-born actor does of Owen Wilson helped land him a role in I Saw the Light. In the film, Hiddleston plays the influential singer-songwriter of the Grand Ole Opry, Hank Williams, opposite Elizabeth Olsen.

“I saw him in War Horse, and thought he looked a lot like Hank Williams,” said Marc Abraham, director of I Saw the Light. “And my casting director said, ‘You’ve got to make sure he can do the accent,’ and over a three-hour dinner [Hiddleston] showed me his imitation of Owen Wilson.”

Hiddleston perfected the impression on the set of Midnight in Paris a few years ago, where the actors worked side by side. Here’s a clip of him telling the story in his own words, and yes — he also does the Owen Wilson voice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bI7aBJrarhg

“It’s an expression of admiration,” Hiddleston said on The Graham Norton Show last fall of his talent. “I do impressions of people that I admire.” Here he shows off his Owen Wilson impression again, plus treats us to a great Christopher Walken, Al Pacino and Robert De Niro (who also happens to be a guest on the show).

Who knew that imitating Owen Wilson’s drawl would pay off in such a big way?