Come From Away concerns days following the terror attacks of 9/11/2001, when American air space was closed and 38 planes landed at the small airport in Gander, Newfoundland. Twelve actors portray both the travelers and the natives who host them during days of uncertain waiting. My friend Suzanne and I saw the touring company Saturday, June 29, in Atlanta's Fox Theatre, where the audience stood and cheered for the cast and the Celtic band that accompanies nearly every minute of the show.
[Photo by Matthew Murphy: The setting by Beowulf Borritt is a neutral space, trees suggesting the forested island, the slatted wall with scrim for projections and occasional openings of doors into rooms or the hatch to the hull of a plane, and chairs that suggest bars, offices, and seats on a plane.]
Creators Irene Sankoff and David Hein make each number a collage of their characters' perspectives on a theme. "Welcome to the Rock" gives us life in Newfoundland with pithy asides to introduce the mayor, the teacher, the ASPCA director, and others, going about their business before news breaks of the terror attacks in New York and Washington. Then, with a simple reconfiguration of chairs on stage and slight shifts in costume, those same actors become passengers, anxious when their planes are diverted to they - know - not - where for they - know - not - why. We become well - acquainted with some twenty endearing characters played by a mere twelve actors. For example, actor Nick Duckart gets some of the funniest lines as "Kevin J.," partner and "sexy-tary" to "Kevin T.," but then dons a prayercap to play Egyptian passenger "Ali," who gets our sympathy when he faces unfounded suspicion and even hostility everywhere he turns.
With so much fluidity in the action, Sankoff and Hein give us some places to rest in one spot, numbers that naturally stand out for that difference. There's one solo, "I am Here," sung by "Hannah" (Danielle Thomas), a mother unable to reach her son in New York during the week after the attack. The prayer of St. Francis (Lord, make me an instrument of your peace) sets the base line for an interweaving of Muslim and Orthodox "Prayers". When anxieties boil over in a song called "On the Edge," the natives host a party where they enact a local ritual to make Newfoundlanders from those who "come from away." (Drinking and kissing a fish are involved.) A pilot, "Beverley" (Becky Gulsvig) recounts how she realized her lifelong ambition to be captain of a plane, and her fear that the planes, parked in mud as a storm approaches, will never be able to leave the island.
Local radio host Lois Reitzes (NPR station WABE) interviewed actress Gulsvig along with the real - life pilot she portrays, Captain Beverley Bass. We learned that Sankoff and Hein introduced themselves to Bass at the ten - year reunion at Gander, Newfoundland, collecting memories of the ordeal from her and others. The creators scaffolded the show on a simple day - by - day account of what happened on the ground, and filled it out with the real - life participants' memories of personal anecdotes and reflections. Bass says she heard nothing more about a musical until she was invited to the premiere of the show nearly seven years later.
I'm reminded of a Broadway classic also constructed from numerous interviews, A Chorus Line. In a theatre piece built from so many strands, there won't be through - line with some big surprising climax, but there is the cumulative effect of strangers coming to love each other: the people of Newfoundland, the people who "came from away," and us.
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