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Tom Hanks admitted on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert that he forgot his lines during a performance of his new Off-Broadway play, This World of Tomorrow

The Oscar winner joked that since he co-wrote the show, “they are gonna have a real hard time firing me”

Hanks stars in the production alongside Kelli O’Hara and Ruben Santiago-Hudson

Tom Hanks may have written the script, but that doesn’t mean he always remembers it!

The two-time Oscar winner is back on stage in This World of Tomorrow, the new Off-Broadway play he co-wrote. And while promoting the project on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on Monday, Nov. 3, Hanks admitted he's already gone up on his lines during preview performances.

"I disappeared the other night, as a matter of fact," he told Colbert, joking that his costars in the play Kelli O’Hara and Ruben Santiago-Hudson "all just kind of look at me and go, ‘Come on, man. I learned my lines, haven’t you learned yours?' "

Asked if it felt different to act in something he’d penned himself, Hanks, 69, quipped, “Yes it is. No. 1 because, they are gonna have a real hard time firing me if I screw up.”

Tom Hanks in 'This World of Tomorrow'.

Marc J. Franklin. Courtesy The Shed

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He went on to explain that while co-writing the play with James Glossman has been "a pleasure and a joy," it's also "as terrifying a situation I've ever had."

"The huge difference between film and stage is, in film the director is the governor of the story. He can change it, not say it, don't say that, say this instead," explained Hanks. "The stage, if it's not on the page, it ain't on the stage. The writers are the definitive arbiters of what is being said."

That gives Hanks pressure to make sure every word is right. "You have a discussion and say, 'Okay, what sounds better — 'Hey guys, we better get going because we have a problem,' or, 'Hey guys, we better get going because we have a situation?' " he said, noting how nervous those decisions make him. "You just wake up and go, 'Problem? Situation? Problem? Situation?' "

Kelli O'Hara and Tom Hanks in 'This World of Tomorrow'.

Marc J. Franklin. Courtesy The Shed

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This World of Tomorrow is now in performances at The Shed in New York City. Its eight-week limited run is currently scheduled through Dec. 21.

Hanks, 69, takes on the lead role of Bert Allenberry in the play. The show follows a lonely scientist from the future who travels back in time to the 1939 World’s Fair in Queens in search of love.

In addition to O'Hara and Santiago-Hudson, the cast also features Kerry Bishé, Kayli Carter, Paul Murphy, Jamie Ann Romero, Lee Aaron Rosen, Jay O. Sanders, Donald Webber Jr. and Michelle Wilson. Many take on multiple roles in the play.

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This marks Hanks’s first stage role since his 2013 Broadway debut in Lucky Guy, which earned him a Tony nomination. He and Glossman — have previously collaborated on 2022's Safe Home, a stage piece also based on stories from Hanks’s 2017 book, Uncommon Type — have been working with Shed to develop This World of Tomorrow over the past year.

"I'm excited to collaborate with the remarkable Tom Hanks on his and James Glossman's new play at The Shed this fall," director Kenny Leon said back in May, when the production was announced. "It will be a joy to experience Tom leading the cast on stage in this time-traveling adventure of the limitless power of love and the distance one is willing to go for it. This story explores a fascinating tale of the echoes of past generations, the often-surprising collisions between them, and what is carried forward with an authentic humor I can’t wait to bring to life in the Griffin Theater."

Tickets to This World of Tomorrow are now on sale.