(L-R) Jessica Hargrave, Tig Notaro, Stef Willen, Ryan White, Megan Falley, and Andrea Gibson attend the 2025 Sundance Film Festival “Come See Me in the Good Light” premiere at Library Center Theatre. (Photo by Chad Salvador/Shutterstock for Sundance Film Festival)
By Jessica Herndon
The unmistakable power of Andrea Gibson’s poetry is their radical vulnerability — the ability to hold both heartbreak and hope in a single line. In Come See Me in the Good Light, which debuted in the Premieres section of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival, director Ryan White beautifully captures Gibson’s kaleidoscope of emotions as they navigate a terminal cancer diagnosis with their wife, fellow poet Megan Falley, by their side. The film explores death — and what it means to truly live — with intense honesty, sensitivity, and unexpected humor.
Following the film’s January 25 premiere at the Library Center Theatre, producer Tig Notaro gets on the mic to share that she didn’t have to do much pitching to White’s team to get production on this film going, due to the incredibly compelling subjects and subject matter. But she knew she’d need to find financing. “So obviously I called Abby Wambach and Glenn Doyle at way past their bedtime — 8 p.m. — and I said, ‘Hey, I want to talk to you about a project with Andrea and Meg,’” Notaro says, eliciting laughs from the crowd. “Within minutes they’d hopped on a Zoom call and within the hour I got a text saying, ‘We’re in for half a million.’”
Gibson, a Colorado-based spoken word performer and poet, has spent their career baring their soul on stages and in intimate collections of poetry. In this deeply personal documentary, Gibson reflects on the profound intersection of art, identity, and mortality, with readings of poems like “Tincture,” a yearning for time they’ll never have, and “My Emotional Bucket List,” a tender ode to the small but meaningful moments that define a life: tipping a barista, cleaning the garage, and “telling all of my secrets,” they say in the film.
White, whose previous Sundance credits include Ask Dr. Ruth (2019) and Assassins (2020), crafts a story that feels universal. With powerhouse executive producers Brandi Carlile and Sara Bareilles lending their support, the documentary becomes a deeply moving portrait of love and resilience. What begins with a devastating diagnosis evolves into a celebration of the moments that make life worth living.
After being diagnosed with ovarian cancer, Gibson was initially given two years to live. They endured grueling rounds of chemotherapy and a radical hysterectomy, only to face the cancer’s return. When Gibson and Falley agreed to do the doc after they were pitched the idea by Notaro and producer Stef Willen in 2023, it came time to select a film crew. For Falley, it was a no-brainer to hire White and his team, she tells the audience in the post-premiere Q&A. “We had watched Pamela, A Love Story [directed by White] and we were obsessed — because we relate so much to Pamela,” Falley says, as the crowd giggles. “We had spent the last couple of years going through the cancer journey just us — we wanted community around us.” Adds Gibson, “We had spent so much time alone with ourselves. We didn’t know how much we needed people in our home. I think it was the first day that we told them that we loved them.” Says White, “This last year of making this film has been the most joyful, fun, and funny year of maybe my life in totality — and that’s because of Andrea Gibson and Megan Falley.”
Determined to live fully in the time that remains, Gibson basks in joy, tenderness, and their bond with Falley. The film turns its lens on her, too, revealing Falley’s grace and strength as she navigates the impossible balance between grief and presence.
The couple’s love story is the emotional heartbeat of the film. “It’s the weirdest thing to say,” Gibson says in the film, “but if I die, Meg’s really going to need me to support her through those feelings. I can’t stand the idea of not being there for her through that.” It’s these moments of dark humor that make the film a standout.
We’re invited into the most private corners of their lives: doctors’ appointments, test results, and Gibson’s consideration to perform their first live show in four years. Through it all, Come See Me in the Good Light illuminates the enduring power of love and art to help us find meaning, even in the face of the unthinkable.
“I’m sure many of you know that documentaries typically take much longer than a year,” says Gibson. “It took a year to make this film, and I never expected to live to see it and so it is my feeling that they completed this at a rapid pace so that I would be able to see it, and it’s just so wonderful.”
