We all know about September 11th. Most of us can remember where we were when the news broke. I was in an outreach office in Harold Hill, about to close up for the day and go out to dinner with friends. We didn’t go out for dinner. We sat, stunned and appalled as the drama unfolded.
Except it wasn’t drama. We watched as real people jumped out of the windows of the Trade Centre rather than suffocate in the smoke of the planes that had been crashed beneath them. We watched as a third plane was crashed into the Pentagon. We watched as the crew and passengers of a fourth plane revolted against the terrorists and brought the plane down in Pennsylvania, knowing full well they would all be killed rather than hit Washington DC, possibly the White House.
What few of us thought about at the time was all the people who were still in the air, ordered to land at the nearest airport big enough for their planes across the entirety of continental America. For the passengers of 38 planes, that meant landing at Gander, Newfoundland.
Drama
And here another drama was born, entirely by accident, and not until many years later. And here began one of the best musicals I have ever seen. Welcome, indeed, to the rock! We went to see Come from Away on Wednesday 6th July, at the Phoenix Theatre in London. I have to say, it was my choice and I already suspected that Joyce was humouring me, as I had chosen it. I had no idea about the details of the story, though I was vaguely aware. I certainly didn’t know it was a musical I have to say that the last term has been a long one and we needed a bit of a boost.
Remarkable
What we witnessed was remarkable. ‘Come from away’ is the Newfie term for an incomer, a visitor, a tourist, and lets face it, a bit like the Cornish relationship with Grockles, it’s a bit of a love-hate one. I’m not really doing the profundity of the experience justice. We were mindblown by the music, the sheer cleverness of the staging, and the multi-part acting of all the cast.
Even more remarkable is that one of the stories told, is that of Beverley Bass, not only one of the 38 Captains stranded there, but the first female captain of an American Airlines commercial plane. I do love when women’s stories start intersecting. Alice Fearn plays her with remarkable energy and grit. Fearn is blessed over other actors in that she physically resembles Bass, even though she is 13 years younger than the pilot at the time of the story. I’m sure Fearn would not be pleased I’ve said this, but its true, and it helps, or it helps me, anyway.
Foot stomping
The sheer foot stomping, energy driven nature of the music somehow manages to aid the complexity of the story. It helps to demonstrate the concerns of those who looked after the animals left in the holds of the planes, the single Muslim passenger who was not treated well due to the circumstances, the relationships made and broken by them. The show is a funny length, an hour and 40 mins. It doesn’t have an interval and it all adds to the atmosphere. I don’t give standing ovations lightly, but I joined the majority of the rest of the audience on my feet, whooping and hollering like a good’un
The show is on in London until January next year, so Come From Away to wherever you can find yourself a performance and join those of us who can say we’ve been Welcomed to the Rock.