In April 2016, she took a trip down to Charleston, W.Va., where the mining company’s former chief executive, Donald L. Blankenship, was being sentenced to prison after he was convicted of conspiring to violate federal safety standards at the nonunion Upper Big Branch mine. There, she introduced herself to the family members of the dead miners. Later on, they introduced her to others.

The resulting play, “Coal Country,” which is now in previews and opens on March 3, is an artfully edited patchwork of memories from the days before and after the explosion ripped through the mine and tore families apart. Among the voices are a miner who lost three family members in the blast; a union loyalist troubled to observe workers intimidated into silence by their new bosses; and a wife who had vainly begged her husband to put his safety first.

Blank and Jensen want Manhattan theatergoers to sit and listen to these stories of people who live deep in Trump country, where coal mining is inextricably linked with daily life and the national press tends to only visit when there’s a disaster.

It’s a well-known refrain that theater is a way to facilitate empathy, and these playwrights noticed a specific lack of it between their subjects and their audience.