Come From Away: The true story behind the hit musical coming to Sydney

The multi award-winning show follows the real-life journey of 7000 air passengers who became grounded in Canada in the wake of the 9/11 tragedy.

September 11, 2001 began like any ordinary day for David Hein and Irene Sankoff.

Young and engaged to be married, they were sharing student accommodation in New York’s Manhattan while studying acting and music and performing in small shows.

“I remember my alarm going off,” Sankoff says. “Before I hit snooze I managed to hear that a helicopter had crashed into one of the (World Trade Centre) towers.

“I remember thinking, ‘oh my gosh, New York is crazy’. And then my dad phoned and said, ‘don’t go to school today, there’s been a terrorist attack’.”

What happened during the attacks on America that morning had nothing to do with helicopters and everything to do with hijacked planes that obliterated World Trade Centre and badly damaged the Pentagon in Washington.

The international cast of Come From Away.

A fourth plane crashed into a field in Pennsylvania after passengers attempted to wrest back the controls. In all, almost 3000 people died.

Hein and Sankoff had no idea they would be part of the recovery effort after all the death and devastation inflicted that day.

Their part in the reclamation of humanity from the ashes of 9/11 would come exactly 10 years later, when they travelled to the Canadian province of Newfoundland to meet the good people of a remote outpost called Gander — and the people they had taken into their homes and hearts as the horror and meaning of 9/11 dawned.

The couple stayed a month. They met just about everyone in town and recorded details of the extraordinary role that Gander played in the aftermath of 9/11.

Full of the joyous and generous stories they had collected in Gander, Hein and Sankoff returned home to write a piece of musical theatre.

Phliip Lowe and his wife Zoe Gertz are both performing in Come From Away. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

Called Come From Away, the multi award-winning show opens in Sydney’s Capitol Theatre on June 3. The cast includes Zoe Gertz, Phillip Lowe, Sarah Morrison and Katrina Retallick.

Central to the story of Come From Away is the surprising fact that the homely town of Gander is strategically located for refuelling air traffic and therefore boasts a disproportionately large airport.

On 9/11, when airspace above the US and Canada was closed down, 38 international flights were diverted away from the danger zone and ordered to land at Gander.

When 7000 passengers got off those planes, under instruction to leave their luggage on board, there was a sudden and urgent need for everything from showers and beds to clothing and food.

Gander stepped up to the challenge without waiting to be asked. Spare rooms were prepared for weary travellers to lay their heads, kitchens worked overtime to feed them, clothes were loaned and even car keys were handed over so families could explore the remote location where fate had washed them up.

For Newfoundlanders, kindness is a “way of life”, Sankoff says. “You know, they say that because of the harsh, harsh weather, Newfoundlanders have to take care of each other or else no one would survive,” she says.

Zoe Gertz and the rest of the cast at the media call. Picture: Annette Dew

“If someone shows up on your doorstep in the middle of a snowstorm, you have to let them in or else they’re not going to survive — and you don’t know if it’s going to be you or one of your loved ones the next time that needs the help.”

Gander literally changed the lives of some of the travellers — the “come from aways”, as the Newfound-landers picturesquely call them.

“There’s a wonderful story about the mother of a firefighter who was in the (Twin) Towers,” Sankoff says.

“She was stranded in Gander waiting for news, and she was befriended by the mother of a firefighter in Newfoundland.

“She just took her under her wing and knew exactly what she would be feeling.”

Approaching the 20th anniversary of 9/11 later this year, those two mothers are still in contact.

“The mayor, who is a character in the show, says ‘on the first day we had 7000 stranded strangers, by the middle of the week we had 7000 friends, and by the end of the week we said goodbye to 7000 family members,” Hein says.

Photos from the musical Come From Away

Australian producer Rodney Rigby has been part of the production team for Come From Away since its debut in California in 2015.

He says the show has spawned a mini tourist boom for Gander which only abated because of the pandemic.

Tourists want to see the local sights including, of course, the famous airport.

In October 2016 the producers staged the show in the Gander ice hockey rink to two audiences of 2500 each. For the Ganderfolks, it was a moment of pride.

“They saw themselves represented in the most loving, caring and honest way,” Rigby says.

Even at a Rolling Stones concert, Rigby has never heard an audience roar like the one in Gander.

“It was the best thing in the world,” he says.

Come From Away, from June 3, Capitol Theatre, from $85, comefromaway.com.au