Fredericton-born actor gets dream role on streaming version of Come From Away

For Fredericton's Tony LePage, the success of the Broadway musical Come From Away is about to provide a big break on the small screen.

LePage spent three years as an understudy on the musical's Broadway run, which has been on hiatus since Broadway shut down as part of COVID-19 restrictions in March 2020.

Now, as the theatre district prepares to reopen, LePage has announced he'll take on a major role as the musical comes to Apple TV+ in September.

"It's hard to put into words exactly how special this is, I mean to be entrusted with the role that is going to be sort of captured forever, you know, is a huge, huge deal," LePage told Harry Forestell, the host of CBC News New Brunswick at Six.

He calls it "a dream come true."

Come From Away is the Canadian musical that tells the story of how the small town of Gander welcomed people stranded by the grounding of aircraft in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks on the U.S.

It went to Broadway in 2017 and was nominated for seven Tony Awards.

Since most members of the cast play several roles, LePage will perform as Garth, Kevin Tuerff and others for the televised version, and it's a major part.

LePage understudied the role during his three years with the production, but this new opportunity came after the pandemic shut down live theatre.

"During that time, the producers of Hamilton, I don't know if anyone out there has seen Hamilton, it's the same producers, and a couple of different production teams have decided they want to film the live stage show. And I got chosen for the role, and it's one of the biggest things that has ever happened to me, and I am so grateful." 

Shooting the onstage musical wasn't just a matter of showing up and performing for the cameras once.

"We've performed the show probably 12 times, and so what they do is they're picking and choosing different shots, because we had to do one with, there was this huge crane out in the middle of the audience to get wide shots, we perform it for that, then we'd perform it for closeups," LePage said.

He said it's up to director Christopher Ashley to piece it all together.

LePage is also headed back to Broadway as live theatre comes back to life in New York next month.

Rehearsals start Aug. 30, and the show opens Sept. 21. But LePage will be part of a concert version in front of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington on Sept. 10.

This commemorative concert will take place the day before the 20th anniversary of attacks on New York City and Washington. 

"I mean it's just honour after honour for me, I just feel so lucky," LePage said. "It's kind of incredible. To be honest, I hope the show runs forever. I would love to see it run as long as possible. … My main thing with Come From Away is I just want as many people as possible to see it.

"And so, the longer it runs on Broadway, the more people who get to see it, because I truly believe people are different when they leave the theatre."

That's why he's excited about it streaming on Apple TV+ next month.

"I think that this is a show that people are better for having seen it."