Student Story by Eamon Shaw

More than 30 Winfield community members came together this summer with Southwestern College Performing Arts to perform the Broadway Musical, “Come From Away,” drawing  more than 1,000 audience members.

The musical “Come From Away” centers on real-life events that took place during Sept. 11, 2001. When U.S. airspace closed, the small town of Gander, Newfoundland took in nearly 7,000 displaced passengers.

The local residents responded with compassion, ensuring the displaced passengers were fed, supplied, and comforted for five days. 

“Originally, the whole concept of this was that this was the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 tragedy,” McGonigle said, “When 9/11 happened, they rerouted planes from the American airspace to Gander, Newfoundland, and it’s about the humanity of these people and this town that rallied.”

McGonigle highlighted the show as one he’s always wanted to do. Knowing the play was difficult, he opened auditions out to the community.

“We rehearsed through June and July, and the show performed at the end of July. We had a huge crowd, more than 1,000 people attended,” McGonigle added. 

“We ended up with about over 30 people involved and we had ages and experience levels of all kinds.” 

A Southwestern Alum was able to take care of the expenses that came out to be around $15,000, and the money that came in as donations was dispersed to first responders in Cowley County to recognize the people doing good work in the community. 

McGonigle said it’s the hardest play he’s ever done in his almost 60 years of directing theatre. 

“The Broadway production was written for a cast of 12 people to play 156 different characters,” he said on the preparation for the show, “There are the people who live in Newfoundland and the plane people, and I divided the two groups, which made it easier. It worked really well.”

McGonigle highlighted the wide variety of backgrounds and ages. He centered on one woman who was supposed to be on the plane that crashed into the Pentagon. She was one of the community members in the play. 

“She was working in Washington D.C,” McGonigle said of the woman in the show supposed to be on the plane that crashed into the Pentagon, “Something happened, and she got delayed another day for a meeting, so she didn’t get on that plane.”

The tragedy touched many lives, and McGonigle noticed genuine feedback on a play covering a major human event. 

“All of us that were alert to what was going on, we knew exactly where we were and what we were doing. It’s a whole range of emotions, and the story just touches you,” McGonigle added. 

“It was very exciting to have those audiences there and genuinely involved with what was going on in the show, the show is about the frustrations, but the genuine outreach and humanity shown.”