While most people and celebrities celebrate St. Patrick’s Day with green beer and Irish tunes; Jake Gyllenhaal decided to spend his afternoon at a Boston hospital where he brought some smiles – and luck – to patients there.
Jake spent St. Patrick’s Day at Spaulding Rehabilitation Center in Boston while preparing for his new film Stronger in which he will play Boston Marathon survivor Jeff Bauman. Jake spent time in Boston checking out the area to get a feel for the film – visiting places Jeff had spent time, including the rehab center, and various places around the city.
A rep talked of Jake’s visit and said this about his time there.
“Everybody who met him enjoyed it,” said the rep. “He was happy. He was very easy. He visited because he was researching the movie, but he was nice enough to spend a couple extra minutes with people.”
While the visit was unofficial, he inspired the lives of each patient he visited – specifically a 24 year old National Women’s Hockey League forward, Denna Laing, who experienced a severe spinal injury during a game. Denna shared her special afternoon on Twitter saying she had an awesome St. Patrick’s day.
Jake not only met current patients at the center on his journey to being able to successfully transform into his character; he spent time with Jeff himself earlier this year. Jeff’s life was forever changed when he lost both legs in the Boston Marathon Bombing – his story is one that has a happy middle though as he has gone on to live a happy life and even brought a child into the world in 2014!
Stronger is set to release in 2017 and we think Jake spending some time in the city, getting local, and experiencing life as close to the way Jeff did as possible was not only great for his character development – but a treat for the people who he came across.