Sheila Francisco Joins Pangdemonium’s ‘Come From Away’ in Singapore

Sheila Francisco Joins Pangdemonium’s ‘Come From Away’ in Singapore

Sheila Francisco is set to reprise her role as Beulah in Pangdemonium’s staging of the Broadway musical Come From Away, running from September 11 to 27 at the Victoria Theatre in Singapore.

Francisco previously played the role in the 2025 production mounted by GMG Productions and Stages Production Specialists, Inc., which ran from June 6 to 29 at the Samsung Performing Arts Theater. That production went on to win two awards at the recently concluded Philstage Gawad Buhay Awards, including Outstanding Ensemble Performance for a Musical.

Reflecting on returning to the role, Francisco says her portrayal will continue to be grounded in the real women who inspired Beulah.

“I don’t think the approach will be massively different because her character was based on a real person. Or rather two real people. Beulah Cooper and Diane Davis. Beulah was a legion member, who volunteered to organize food and supply flow for the stranded passengers. Diane on the other hand was a teacher who actually worked at Gander Academy,” she says.

“Both women were compassionate and nurturing. Perhaps what may be different will be the dynamics by which I make real those characteristics based on my interactions with my fellow actors.”

Joining Francisco in the show’s 12-person ensemble are Benjamin Chow, Inch Chua, Candice De Rozario, Rebekah Sangeetha Dorai, Brandon Gill, Eric Larrea, Dwayne Lau, Gavin Leahy, Lim Yu-Beng, Victoria Mintey, and Nadya Zaheer.

Francisco is also looking forward to seeing how Singaporean audiences respond to the musical.

“I myself was a mess when I saw the New York production in 2018,” she says. “I was overwhelmed by the reaction of the Filipino audience last year when we mounted it. I’m almost certain that Come From Away will elicit a similar response to the universal messages of kindness, love and empathy.”

Timothy Koh directs the production, marking his musical directing debut. In a video released by the company, he shared, “2026 is actually the 25th anniversary of 9-11, so it is actually a very timely moment for us as an international community to reflect on what happened 25 years ago. At the same time, I think that as our world has gotten increasingly frazzled and fractured and there’s a lot of strife, it is good to remind ourselves of the inherent humanity of every human person.”

Come From Away will mark Pangdemonium’s final production. Earlier this year, co-founders and co-artistic directors Tracie Pang and Adrian Pang announced that the Singapore theater company will wind down at the end of its 2026 finale season, concluding its 16-year run.

The show follows Pangdemonium’s 2026 productions of Force Majeure and A Mirror. Francisco is the latest Filipino performer to appear in a Pangdemonium production, following Pinky Amador in the title role of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? in 2024 and Menchu Lauchengco-Yulo in the title role of Kimberly Akimbo in 2025.

Ticket prices are as follows:

Preview (September 11)
Standard: S$85, S$70, S$55, S$40

Friday and Saturday evenings (Peak)
Standard: S$125, S$110, S$85, S$50

Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and matinees (Off-Peak)
Standard: S$105, S$90, S$75, S$45

U25 Youth Fund Tickets (available only for selected performances)
Standard: S$25

The one-act musical features a book, music, and lyrics by Irene Sankoff and David Hein. It tells the true story of how the small town of Gander, Newfoundland, welcomed nearly 7,000 stranded airline passengers after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks forced North American airspace to close for the first time in history. It opened on Broadway in 2017, where it received seven Tony Award nominations and won Best Direction of a Musical for Christopher Ashley.