‘Come From Away’ tells the uplifting story following 9/11 tragedy
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Millennial Theatre Company Director Joe Asente didn't have much interest in "Come From Away" when he first heard about it.
"I was a little skeptical when I heard that there was a 9/11 musical, and I avoided it for years," he said.
But when he was looking for something to watch on a flight home from Florida, he decided to give it a chance, downloading the capture of the Broadway production available on Apple TV.
"I watched it, and I just fell in love with it," Asente said. "Many members of our board had very similar experiences where they initially wrote it off and just came to love the show."
MTC will stage the Irene Sankoff and David Hein musical for a two-weekend run starting Friday at Youngstown Playhouse.
With 2026 being the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York City and Washington, D.C., and "Come From Away" recently becoming available to community and non-professional theater companies, the musical has been a popular programming choice this fall. Top Hat Productions in Struthers had a sold-out run in September.
It's particularly appropriate for a theater company named for the generation born between 1981 and 1996.
"The millennial generation is defined by our experience tied to 9/11," Asente said. "The defining factor between millennial and Gen Z are those who can remember a time and what life was like prior to 9/11, and then also be able to fully experience that switch and the change and what things came after.
"The opportunity to do a show that I think is as meaningful to our society in a collective way as this show is, and then on top of it being the 25th anniversary, and then on top of it the connections that my generation has to 9/11 and all that’s changed in our lives since then, it just was a no-brainer for us."
The musical is based on the true story of the travelers on 9/11 whose flights were diverted to a remote airport in Newfoundland after all air travel halted. The townspeople of Gander and other small Canadian communities came to their aid, providing food and shelter, as well as compassion and a desire to make an agonizing situation a little more bearable.
"It’s much less about 9/11 as it is about 9/12, 13, and 14," Asente said. "The act of terrorism on 9/11 plays such a small part in the show itself. It’s so much more about what came after and the positive things that came out after. I think that its decision to focus on that is really where this musical succeeds.
"Years and years and years of watching 9/11 documentaries in school, pretty much every single year throughout my education, this story was never touched upon. It was always all the horrible things that happened that day, and those are incredibly important and necessary for everyone to understand. But I think it’s also just as meaningful to understand a positive story that came from that day. I think in a world as divisive as the one that we live in, it’s important to see stories of people coming together and crossing the boundaries of differences, and welcoming in a stranger and treating each other the way that we want to be treated. Because I think there’s just too little of that right now."
MTC's production will feature a nine-member orchestra accompanying the performers. That's one of the main reasons Asente picked the Playhouse's Main Stage to present the show.
"The cast and the orchestra work in tandem in more of a direct way than I think most musicals do," he said. "The orchestra is kind of the 13th scripted character in the show."
Cari Auth is the music director, and Colleen Chance is the choreographer and a member of the cast.
The rest of the cast features Maureen Collins, Kali Davies-Anderson, Molly Galano, Terry Shears, Jillian Hibbard, Rachel Franek, Beni El-Dalati Cruz, Ashley Conway, Arcale Peace, Ty Hanes, Sierra Ellis-Perry, Jacob Nash, Eric McCrea, Andy Scott, Michelle Jalbert, Jill Cataldi, Brian Mann and Erik Anderson.
MTC is embracing the spirit of the show offstage as well. Kevin Teurff, the inspiration for one of the characters in "Come from Away," founded the Pay It Forward 9/11, an organization that encourages people to do acts of kindness on Sept. 11 to carry on the spirit of giving reflected in the real life story.
The theater did a crowdfunding campaign and distributed the proceeds to the cast members, who performed good deeds on Sept. 11.
"It was such a success that we still had a ton of money left over from it, and we'll continue collecting through the run," Asente said. "Our cast is going to go out in the next week or so and do a round two of that, paying it forward to members of our community. I think this show is not only incredibly satisfying from a theatrical or audience standpoint, but I think it has the potential to do a lot of good in a lot of communities."
WHAT: Millennial Theatre Company -- "Come From Away"
WHEN: 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday and 2:30 p.m. Sunday through Nov. 15
WHERE: Youngstown Playhouse, 600 Playhouse Lane, Youngstown
HOW MUCH: Tickets are $31 and are available online at youngstownplayhouse.org/boxoffice/ and by calling 330-788-8739.