Tom Hanks co-wrote this quaint, unremarkable time-traveling play adapted from his book of short stories, and stars as Bert Allenberry, a tech entrepreneur from the year 2089, who travels back to the 1939 New York World’s Fair, where he spots Carmen Perry (Kelli O’Hara) and becomes besotted with her, returning again and again to June 8, 1939 to spend time with her. 

Before the play begins, the ushers handed each of us a button that says “I Have Seen The Future,” which is what visitors received after attending Futurama, a diorama and ride at the General Motors Pavilion in the 1939 Fair that imagined what America would be like in the year 1960.   This is of course meant to be ironic, but it winds up doubly so. “This World of Tomorrow,” which opened tonight at The Shed, is as old-fashioned as they come, like an overlong episode of an awkward early 1950s TV series. 

At the same time, though,  the show has its charms; how could it not, when it’s a romance starring Tom Hanks and Kelli O’Hara?  There is a simple, unexpected pleasure in just being able to see Hanks’ reactions whenever he’s on stage – to see how engaged he is even when he doesn’t have any lines to say (without our needing to rely on a cameraman’s choices.) And the cast also features such versatile New York stage performers as Ruben Santiago-Hudson, Jay O. Sanders and  Donald Webber Jr.,  in a production put together by a team of much-admired Broadway talents.   

 I would feel churlish offering a lengthy catalogue of all the ways the play falls short as a work of contemporary theater; it seems largely beside the point.  The production offers the rare thrill not only of watching this beloved movie star in person, but of seeing something of his that feels almost homespun.

  The program for “This World of Tomorrow” features an extensive interview with Hanks and James Glossman that explains how the play came about, initiated by Glossman after he read Hanks’ 2017  short story collection  entitled “Uncommon Type,” his first published work of fiction. The play they eventually worked out together takes its plot primarily from the story “The Past Is Important to Us,” about Bert and Carmen, but combines it with characters and scenes from some of the other stories in the collection. This explains the seemingly out-of-nowhere scenes that take place in 1953 at the Olympic Diner near Sheridan Square, where Bert and Carmen meet again, but which also focus on the diner’s Greek owner Costas (Sanders, a standout) and his interaction with a fellow immigrant, Assan (Webber) who is asking for a job. (This is derived from the tail end of a long story, “Go See Costas.”) To incorporate Costas into the main plot, he perceives that Bert is still pining for the now-married Carmen, and that she is not happy with her choice, so he offers Bert an observation that’s more like a piece of advice, and somehow feels like the theme of the play: “She is waiting for tomorrow. And you? You are here looking for yesterday.”

In general, the original stories are more detailed, clearer and sharper.  Rather than spoil the ending (which is radically different), I’ll give a smaller example: In the book, Bert, who is a very rich man in his Sixties, is married to his fourth (and much younger) wife, when he meets Carmen, which makes his longing for her adulterous.  On stage,  he is not married to Cyndee (Kerry Bishé), but rather has what she calls an “Intimate Relations Contract” – which I suppose is intended both to offer us a glimpse into the weirdness of relationships in the future and also make more wholesome his pursuit of Carmen. 

Cyndee’s phrase is among the mildest of the futuristic language in the play, which is overstuffed with technobabble — Bert made his fortune by co-developing the “Organic Interface Aggregation,” which is “the principle for the Digital Valve-Relay” – and worse:  “You’ve gone prostrate at the throne of Nostalgia in worship of Chronos, the God of Time,”  his business partner, whose name is M-Dash (Santiago-Hudson) admonishes him. (To be fair, there are some romantic lines, swoon-worthy or eye-rolling depending on your predisposition: “I met someone special,” Bert says about halfway through the play. “But time got in the way. I still carry a torch for the lady.”)

M-Dash is not wrong about the Nostalgia. Much of “This World of Tomorrow” is taken up with an exhaustive and exhausting rundown of all the sites and rides and exhibitions at the World’s Fair — the Lagoon of Nations, the Trylon and Perisphere, Elektro the Moto-Man, the Parachute Jump, the Avenue of Pioneers, the Futurama, the Television display, etc. etc. — that Bert and Carmen wind up visiting, or at least mentioning, during his repeat visits on June 8, 1939, always in the company of Carmen’s enthusiastic niece Virginia (who is supposed to be a pre-adolescent child, but is portrayed by the obviously adult Kayli Carter.)  The program for the show, in addition to that eight-page interview with Hanks and Glossman, also includes an eight-page insert about the World’s Fair, with photographs of some of the exhibitions mentioned in the play ( and a QR code for more),  Scenic and projection designer Derek McLane projects some of these onto a backdrop of modern-looking columns, and also re-creates a 1930s-style operator-run elevator and newsstand, a  subway platform and subway car, the Bronx apartment where Carmen lives with her brother Max (Sanders again) and his family, a Greek dinner (with signs like “Cheeseburger 25¢”)

The future, by contrast, is far less vivid. The most memorable touch is ELMA (External Learning Machine Associate) an embodied Alexa, portrayed convincingly by Jamie Ann Romero, with the help of a little lighting clue, which indicates when she has been switched on. 

For the most part, as Bert discovers, in this world, yesterday is more alluring.  

This World of Tomorrow
The Shed through December 21
Running time:  2 hours and 15 minutes including intermission. 
Tickets:: $45 to $269
Written by Tom Hanks and James Glossman, based on short stories by Hanks
Directed by Kenny Leon
Scenic and projection design by Derek McLane, costume design by Dede Ayite, lighting design by Adam Honoré, sound design and music composed by Justin Ellington
Cast: Tom Hanks as Bert Alleberry, Kelli O’Haras as Carmen Perry, Kerry Bishe as Cyndee/Woman cashier, Kayli Carter as Virginia Perry, Ruben Santiago-Hudson as M-Dash, Lee Aaron Rosen as Lee/Tommy/Doorman/Sandor, Donald Webber  as Baumgarten/Percy/Clarence/Bud/Sweepr/Alvin/Assan, Jamie Ann Romero as ELMA (External Learning Machine Associate)/Sylvia, Michelle Wilson as Honoria/Late-night cabbie, Paul Murphy as Dr. Tanner/Howard/Nico, Jay O. Sanders as Max/Costas/Booming Voice
Photographs by Marc J. Franklin