The company of the Muny production of Come From Away in St. Louis, Mo. The production will play to at least 50,000 people in the next week.Phillip Hamer/Supplied
Title: Come From Away
Written by: Irene Sankoff and David Hein
Performed by: Heidi Blickenstaff, John Bolton, Ashley Brown, Andréa Burns, Trey DeLuna, Alan H. Green, Adam Heller, Abigail Isom, Tamika Lawrence, Jason Tam, Zoe Vonder Haar, Jacob Keith Watson
Directed by: Seth Sklar-Heyn
Company: The Muny
Venue: James S. McDonnell Stage
City: St. Louis, Mo.
Year: Until July 2
Deep in the American Midwest, there’s a massive amphitheatre, nestled into the hill of a lush, rambling park. It’s 34 or so degrees outside – Missouri lives up to its promise of oppressive humidity and persistent mosquitos – but it feels cooler in the theatre, owing to the enormous, windmill-style fans that sprout between the stadium’s seats.
Anywhere in Canada, this sort of space would be reserved solely for outdoor concerts, festivals or sporting events. But the St. Louis Municipal Opera Theatre – better known as the Muny – only presents one sort of programming: Musical theatre.
Before arriving in St. Louis on Wednesday, I found it difficult to imagine 11,000 people seeing Come From Away at once – and forget about a seven-day run at that scale. In its heyday at the Royal Alexandra Theatre in Toronto, a sold-out show could seat just south of 1,250 people; Broadway’s Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre, meanwhile, where Come From Away played for five years, seats 1,079.
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But on Thursday evening, in the sticky twilight of late-June Missouri, I watched, gobsmacked, as thousands of people poured into the Muny to watch a Canadian musical about kindness.
It’s a milestone production for Irene Sankoff and David Hein’s work, about Canada’s role in the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001. When 38 planes were diverted to Gander, N.L., locals stepped up to welcome the “plane people” – the travellers stranded away from their homes, families and belongings. Lifelong friendships, even marriages, bloomed.
Sankoff and Hein’s musical has always been a gut punch – an emotional sine wave of grief, resilience and hope.
But in director Seth Sklar-Heyn’s Come From Away – among the first to be produced as a “non-replica” production, meaning the creatives were free to interpret and stage the work as they wished – the show is a different beast entirely.
Heidi Blickenstaff in the Muny production.Phillip Hamer/Supplied
At the Muny, the story feels less about Canada and more about humankind. Here, jokes about Tim Hortons and road-blocking moose, usually big punchlines when the show plays north of the border, function more as scenery for the events of the story. References to being queer in a small town, meanwhile, and feeling out the limits of small talk when surrounded by southern Americans, land with a more immediately resonant heft.
It’s an impressive production that had a slightly shaky opening night – a medical emergency in the audience near the top of the show prompted a 10-minute pause, and a few actors seemed to struggle with their lines, mumbling lyrics and monologues as they searched for words.
The Muny, recently awarded the 2025 Regional Theatre Tony Award, works on a highly condensed schedule – the cast of Come From Away had just 11 days to rehearse and refine the full-length musical. A few memory lapses, while unfortunate, aren’t exactly surprising – critics, too, normally don’t review Muny productions until after opening night.
That said, Sklar-Heyn’s cast, studded with Broadway alumni, is just outstanding (and the Newfoundland accents aren’t half-bad). While I adored Cailin Stadnyk’s rendition of Me and the Sky in the most recent Mirvish engagement of Come From Away, Heidi Blickenstaff’s might be my new favourite. The notoriously difficult song might as well have been written for her – the husk of her lower register perfectly suits Captain Beverley Bass’s southern drawl, and easily falls away when the feminist anthem stretches to its higher, more powerful choruses. Tamika Lawrence is another standout as Hannah, the New York woman desperately waiting for news of her firefighter son; John Bolton and Ashley Brown, too, are excellent as unlikely lovebirds Nick and Diane, as is Abigail Isom as reporter Janice.
Perhaps the most significant thrill of a non-replica production of Come From Away is seeing what designers can do with the material outside the margins of Christopher Ashley’s iconic original staging – the mismatched wooden chairs and bright blue backdrop that were used in Toronto, New York and on tour around the world.
Sklar-Heyn’s production leans into the nature of Newfoundland and makes use of the Muny’s immense turntable, with a stair unit that spins to approximate everything from airplanes to Gander’s Dover Fault. Scenic designer Edward E. Haynes Jr.’s set works better in some scenes than in others – the show looks its best when Canadian Jesse Robb’s choreography spreads out the relatively small cast across that cavernous stage – but when the pieces come together, it’s just magic.
Side panels frame the Muny stage with trees of all kinds – dark and moody, autumnal and hopeful – and Mike Tutaj’s video design brilliantly incorporates video footage from Gander in the days following Sept. 11. Real people and trees – the bread and butter of Come From Away.
All in, the Muny’s production of Come From Away – which, conservatively speaking, will play to at least 50,000 people in the next week – signals a promising future for a show that in the last decade has all but defined Canadian musical theatre.
At this point in history, there’s a cutting edge to the Muny’s environs at the geographical (and ideological) epicentre of Trump’s America. But since its inception, Come From Away has been a symbol of the partnership between the U.S. and Canada – the common ground on either side of the world’s longest international border.
From the scorching heat in Missouri, I can confirm that Canada’s most important musical is perhaps even more vital now that that friendship has been tested – and it’s even more poignant when enjoyed under the dim glow of midsummer fireflies, bumbling across the air like airplanes.
