Irene Sankoff and David Hein are a Canadian librettist and composer-lyricist couple, best known for co-writing the Broadway musical Come From Away. After spending several years studying and working in New York the couple returned to Toronto where Hein wrote a song, "My Mother's Lesbian Jewish Wiccan Wedding", about his mother and her later life partner. Sankoff and Hein expanded the song into a play that became a hit at the Toronto Fringe Festival in 2009 and then picked up by Mirvish Productions for a run at Toronto's Panasonic Theatre before touring Canada. As a result of My Mother’s Lesbian Jewish Wiccan Wedding's success, theatre producer Michael Rubinoff approached Hein and Sankoff with his idea about a show based on Operation Yellow Ribbon in which residents of Gander, Newfoundland, housed 7,000 airline passengers who had been stranded at Gander Airport as a result of the grounding of all North American air flights following the September 11 attacks. The couple visited Gander in 2011 during the 10-year reunion of passengers and locals, and subsequently wrote Come from Away based on the stories they learned there.

Listen in to hear them talk about…

Why they became musical theater writers solely to spend more time together.

The Rules they have as a writing team to make sure they stay married…and stay writing together (these are worth the price of this podcast alone!).

How to stand up for your script against big time Broadway veterans when you’re a rookie, and its importance to your show’s success.

Why they never thought that Come From Away would play Broadway, and how that attitude helped get the show here.

The importance of a day job as you’re on your way to write for the theater… or do anything in the theater!


Keep up with me: @KenDavenportBway
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