American Airlines pilot whose grounded flight on 9/11 inspired musical plans to attend Paramount’s production

Saturday evening’s performance of “Come From Away” at Aurora’s Paramount Theatre marks something of a milestone for retired American Airlines pilot Beverley Bass.

When the curtain comes down, Bass will have seen the show she calls a “musical masterpiece” 180 times.

The first female to captain an American Airlines’ jet, Bass isn’t merely a superfan. The Texas resident, who piloted a B-777 bound from Paris to Dallas on Sept. 11, 2001, is the inspiration for one of the characters in the Tony Award-winning musical about how the good-hearted residents of Gander, a small town in Newfoundland, Canada, responded to a tragedy.

On the day of the terror attacks and for several days after, Gander residents fed, housed and clothed some 7,000 airline passengers (equal to about two-thirds of the town’s population) from 38 planes diverted to the town’s airport after federal authorities closed U.S. airspace in response to the attacks.

“I'm honored and proud to be associated with it,” said Bass, who describes the tuner by writer/composer/lyricists Irene Sankoff and David Hein as “the musical that never dies.”

Bass' onstage counterpart, played by Andrea Prestinario, sings the show's de facto 11 o'clock number “Me and the Sky.” In it, an American Airlines pilot named Beverley describes her lifelong passion for flying and her remarkable rise through the ranks to captain her own plane.

Except for a minor bit of artistic license, the song is spot on, said Bass.

Bass met Sankoff and Hein in 2011 when she, along with fellow crew members and former passengers, returned to Gander for events commemorating the 10th anniversary of the terror attacks. She agreed to an interview and spent four hours with the couple. Four years later, they invited her and other “plane people” to La Jolla, California, for the world premiere.

Bass recalled “gasping for air” when Jenn Colella, who originated the role of Beverley and played it on Broadway, sang “Me and the Sky.”

“It was unbelievable,” said Bass.

Ten years after its premiere, the musical still thrills.

“It is still very exciting. There are still parts that make me very happy or a little emotional,” she said, adding “I can get through it without crying, but I can't say the same for my husband.”

Bass, the crew and passengers had flown seven hours when they were diverted to Gander. They remained in the plane, on the tarmac, for the next 21 hours. After they disembarked, the crew occupied the few available hotel rooms while the passengers went to a Knights of Columbus lodge where Bass and her colleagues briefed them every day.

On Sept. 15, 2001, the passengers and crew left Gander for the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport.

“As soon as I got home, I said (to American Airline officials) ‘I'll fly anything you want me to fly,’” Bass recalled. “I would have flown the next day.”

“I wasn't going to let terrorists ruin anything I loved so much,” she said.

Bass retired from American Airlines in 2008 at age 56. She came out of retirement in 2017 and flew private jets for eight years until last December when she retired for the second (and possibly last) time at age 72.

Bass will join the Paramount cast onstage after the performance concludes.

“She could go to so many other productions and she's chosen to see ours,” said Prestinario, who says she is honored to meet Bass.

She’s not the first living person the actress has played. Prestinario portrayed cartoonist Alison Bechdel in multiple productions of “Fun Home,” the musical based on Bechdel's 2006 autobiographical graphic novel “Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic.” Telling a living person’s story is an enormous responsibility, said Prestinario, who studied Bass' mannerisms and researched her life with assistance from Paramount associate director and dramaturg Devon Hayakawa.

“I think I'm going to be nervous,” said the actress, who predicts a performance more emotionally charged than usual with Bass in the audience.

“Everyone's really going to be on top of their game,” she said.