Tom Hiddleston of ‘Avengers’ portrays Hank Williams in ‘I Saw the Light’

He lived fast, died young, left a good-looking corpse. But country legend Hank Williams’ inner life was one of tempestuousness and angst — his body finally giving up under the duress of chronic alcohol abuse in 1953 when the singer was but 29.

The story of Williams’ improbable rise and dramatic fall is told in the new film “I Saw the Light,” opening Friday in the District and starring Tom Hiddleston, perhaps best known to moviegoers as the villainous demigod Loki from the “Avengers” films.

“I think the most surprising thing was how genuinely lonely he was,” Mr. Hiddleston told The Washington Times, trading in the learned Tennessee twang of his onscreen avatar for his natural British lilt.

Because Williams’ music was “so joyful and so infectious” it was surprising to the 35-year-old thespian that Williams was so haunted given that “there’s no clue in that music apart from some of the mournful ballads that he was as isolated as I think he was. And I think the more famous and the successful he became, the more lonely and isolated he became.”

“I Saw the Light” is written and directed by Marc Abraham, a Louisville, Kentucky, native who grew up on the music of Williams as well as such other Nashville legends as Merle Haggard, Kris Kristofferson and George Jones.

“Eventually you do get taken back to the source material [which is] Hank and his interest in country music,” Mr. Abraham said of the music spawned less than 200 miles from where he grew up.

Mr. Abraham got wind nearly a decade ago that a film about Williams’ life was in the work, which spurred him to get his screenplay off the ground as quickly as possible.

“Someone else isn’t going to make this movie,” the filmmaker recalls of his thought process at the time. “Three and a half years ago, Tom and I got together about it.”

Early on in the process, Mr. Hiddleston sent Mr. Abraham a rendition of himself performing Williams’ seminal hit “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry.” While it was certainly necessary to approximate the singular voice of the country legend, both star and filmmaker agreed it was more important to inhabit the spirit of the singer rather than perform a spot-on impersonation.

“The first thing I said was you’ll never sound exactly like Hank Williams,” Mr. Abraham told his star, adding also that he has a particular distaste for lip-synching. “Tom’s an actor, and what we wanted was to have a visceral experience for the audience of who this man was and be close enough on the music so that when the music was embedded inside the film, it resonated as if it were Hank and not some mimicry of him.”

For all of Mr. Abraham’s and Mr. Hiddleston’s wishes to do justice to their subject, Williams’ legend is rife with warts, not the least of which was his alcoholism and chronic infidelity to his wife, which resulted in out-of-wedlock births in addition to his own “legitimate” children, including Hank Williams Jr., a singer in his own right.

Mr. Abraham describes Williams’ lifestyle as tragic, but not quite achieving the “Aristotelian” level.

“I love stories about sad things. I think they’re so evocative,” the filmmaker said, adding that he wanted to tell the story of Williams not “through all of his greatest hits” but rather of how influential he was on American music.

Indeed, Williams’ musical virtuosity has found its way into his descendents. Son Hank Jr., has enjoyed success with his combination of rock/blues/country, and even grandson Hank III is known for his outlaw country style.

It was important to the filmmakers that the family of Williams approve of the end result. Mr. Abraham said he got tremendous support from Williams’ daughters from his marriage, Hillary and Holly, and from his daughter Jett, conceived outside of his marital bonds.

“They were really supportive and made it very clear that it was about their father and their granddad, and it wasn’t about them,” Mr. Abraham said.

Mr. Hiddleston received a letter of gratitude from Jett Williams after seeing the film, in which she both thanked the actor for his portrayal of her father — whom she never met — and also related how closely was the physical resemblance in certain scenes.

“I had been investigating this man’s life for however many weeks, and she came on set and said it was like seeing a ghost,” Mr. Hiddleston said of his character’s daughter seeing him on set. “Jett wrote me a very beautiful letter after a screening [saying] we captured the mixture of his joy and his generosity of spirit as a performer and also his pain.”

Williams’ granddaughter, Holly, said she was touched by a scene that showed Hank and his wife, Audrey (Elizabeth Olsen) singing to her own father, Hank Jr.

“For her that’s a scene about her grandparents singing to her father,” Mr. Hiddleston said. “If she thinks we did right by him, then we’re OK.”