Tom Hanks is heading back to Broadway after a 14-year absence, taking the lead in This World of Tomorrow, a time-travel romance that explores love and the choices that shape our lives. The production will reunite him with acclaimed stage actor Kelli O’Hara, his co-star in the play’s sold-out Off Broadway run at The Shed last year.
According to Variety, the play will mark Hanks’s first Broadway appearance since Lucky Guy, Nora Ephron’s 2013 drama that earned him a Tony Award nomination. The new production will move to a Shubert theatre, although the venue has yet to be announced. The full cast and creative team details will follow.
Hanks based This World of Tomorrow on a series of short stories he wrote. He has co-written the stage adaptation with James Glossman. Set at the end of the 21st century, the play follows Bert Allenberry, who attempts to change his future by travelling back in time.
The story takes Bert repeatedly to one extraordinary day at the 1939 New York World’s Fair in Queens. Along the way, he discovers that the future depends not on technology alone, but on the choices people make for love.
Kenny Leon will direct the Broadway production. His recent credits include The Balusters, Othello, starring Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal, and Our Town, featuring Jim Parsons and Katie Holmes.
Leon welcomed the opportunity to bring the production to a wider audience. “I’m so excited to continue this work on this amazing new American play,” he said. He added that the story offered an opportunity to explore love and time travel further, while expressing his enthusiasm for the stage chemistry between Hanks and O’Hara.
Alex Poots, artistic director of The Shed, said Hanks and O’Hara had co-created and starred in the sold-out run there. He described the play as a story about enduring human connections in a changing world and said its move to Broadway would allow it to reach more people.
Producer Brian Anthony Moreland called Hanks “one of the great storytellers of our time” and described bringing the production to Broadway as an “incredible privilege”.
“There is something extraordinary about bringing a story that explores the power of love across time to a place where the magic of live theatre happens every night,” Moreland said. “At its heart, ‘This World of Tomorrow’ reminds us that no matter how much the world changes, the one thing that remains timeless is our capacity to love.”
