You Had to Be There: How the Toronto Godspell Ignited the Comedy Revolution, Spread Love and Overalls, and Created a Community That Changed the World (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9781963549324)

Jane Mendelsohn is an international and New York Times best-selling author. She is also a screenwriter and producer. Born and raised in New York City, Jane is a graduate of Yale, where she was a Connecticut Student Poet. After attending Yale Law School for a year and a half, she left to pursue writing. She began publishing book reviews in the Village Voice in 1990. Since then, her pieces have appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, The New Republic, The Yale Review, Lit Hub, and the London Review of Books.
Her first novel, I Was Amelia Earhart, was published by Knopf to widespread critical acclaim. It became an international bestseller, was translated into many languages, was short-listed for the Orange Prize, and long-listed for the Dublin Literary Award. In addition to screenplays and theater scripts, she is also the author of the novels Innocence, American Music, and Burning Down the House. Her work has been adapted for both stage and screen. After years of working informally on each other's projects, Jane and Nick formed Series of Dreams in 2025.
She lives in New York City with her husband and daughters.

Stewart F. Lane is a six-time Tony-Award-winning producer for A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder, War Horse, Jay Johnson: The Two & Only, Thoroughly Modern Millie, Will Rogers Follies, and La Cage Aux Folles, as well as a 10-time nominee for the Broadway productions of The Lost Boys, Gore Vidal's The Best Man, The Merchant of Venice starring Al Pacino, Alfred Hitchcock's The 39 Steps, Sunday in the Park with George (revival), Fiddler on the Roof (revival) starring Alfred Molina, Gypsy (revival) starring Bernadette Peters, 1776 (revival), The Goodbye Girl starring Martin Short, and Woman of the Year starring Lauren Bacall. He has been nominated for and received numerous other industry awards including four Drama Desk Awards, a Drama Critics Circle Award, Outer Circle Critics Award, and a Drama League Award. Mr. Lane is President and Chief Executive Officer of Stellar Productions International, Inc. and Stewart F. Lane Productions, Inc. Mr. Lane is co-owner of the legendary Palace Theatre on Broadway with the Nederlander Organization and a partner in the Tribeca Grill with Robert De Niro. He is also the co-founder of BroadwayHD.
Lane is the author of Let's Put on a Show, Second Edition (Broad Book Press 2026), It Happened at the Palace: A History of New York's Iconic Broadway Theatre (Broad Book Press 2024), and Jews on Broadway.
Mr. Lane is on the Board of Trustees of The Actor's Fund of America, the Board of Advisors for The American Theater Wing, and a former member of the Board of Governors of The Broadway League. He has created scholarship funds at Columbia University Business Graduate School, and Boston University College of Fine Arts Undergraduate School, (B.F.A) as well as provided major support to the University of Massachusetts, Emerson College, and Fiorello H. La Guardia High School for the Performing Arts. Mr. Lane is a graduate of the Boston University College of Fine Arts.
He resides with his wife in New York City. For more, please visit www.mrbroadway.com.

Nick Davis is a filmmaker and writer. He is the director and producer of the documentary that inspired You Had to Be There. His latest documentary, This Ordinary Thing, is a film that explores the heroism of the non-Jewish Europeans who helped hide Jews during the Holocaust and features performances by Helen Mirren, F. Murray Abraham, Ellen Burstyn, Carrie Coon, Jeremy Irons, and many more. He also produced and directed Once Upon a Time in Queens for ESPN's "30 for 30" series. He executive produced the Emmy-Award winning The Comeback: 2004 Boston Red Sox for Netflix. Among his other films are Ted Williams: 'The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived, ' for PBS' American Masters series, Blood, Sweat + Gears, a documentary about a cycling team devoted to cleaning up its scandal-ridden sport, Jack: The Last Kennedy Film, an Emmy-y-Award winning portrait of John F. Kennedy, and the acclaimed dark comedy 1999, starring Jennifer Garner, Dan Futterman, Amanda Peet, Buck Henry, Timothy Olyphant, and Stephen Wright.
In 2001, he formed Nick Davis Productions, which has produced over 80 hours of non-fiction and documentary programming for outlets such as A&E, Bravo, History Channel, Sundance Channel, TLC, and more. The company has also produced over 300 videos and films for corporate, non-profit and other private clients. He began in film as an intern on Ken Burns' Baseball.
Nick's first novel, Boone (with Brooks Hansen), was a NY Times notable book of the year. He is also the author of COMPETING WITH IDIOTS: Herman and Joe Mankiewicz, a Dual Portrait, was shortlisted for the LA Times book prize as biography of the year in 2021.Davis performed with Gotham City Improv and You And What Army, and graduated from Harvard, where he was one of the founders of the improv group On Thin Ice. He lives in NYC with Jane Mendelsohn and their two amazing daughters.