About the Play:

The Busy World is Hushed is a full-length drama by Keith Bunin. An Episcopalian Bible Scholar, her estranged son and the writer hired to help her finish her manuscript face unexpected consequences when old family secrets are revealed and new choices must be made. The Busy World Is Hushed is a three-character odyssey into faith, love, and doubt. There are no easy answers as everyone searches for a safe place to land and find peace at the last.

The Busy World is Hushed borrows its title from an end of day prayer by John Henry Newman. Hannah is a widowed Episcopal Minister and Bible scholar writing a book about a newly discovered manuscript that appears to be a lost Gospel, predating the New Testament. To help shape the study, she hires Brandt, a young man whose father is dying of a brain tumour. Searching for "a clear view of God," Hannah is also dealing with Thomas, her wayward son, who is on a search of his own, drifting from job to job, running from commitment and driven by questions about his father's life and death before he was born. As she notices the chemistry brewing between Brandt and her son, she decides to risk all on an unconventional opportunity for reconciliation that has unexpected consequences for all three of them. The Busy World is Hushed examines – with wisdom, humour and insight – the contradictions we find in our faith, our families and ourselves.

The Busy World is Hushed premiered in 2006 at Playwrights Horizons off-Broadway in New York City where it was nominated for the Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Play. The UK premiere was in 2017 at the Finborough Theatre in London. The play has been performed in regional and college theatre productions.

Cast: 1 female, 2 male

What people say:

"Five Stars… Searching, perceptive, and absorbing… a tightly written interrogation of pain and belief… One of New York's essential playwrights, Bunin has written wonderful roles for his actors… Rooting through the intricate tangle of motivations that undergird personal faith, Bunin offers an empathetic and fair-minded view of religion: not as some derisory opiate of the people but as morphine for someone in possibly mortal pain." — Time Out (New York)

"Remarkably ambitious…A theatrical miracle: a complex, thought-provoking look at why religion, faith, and the human heart can't always be reconciled…The script's most amazing facet is how Bunin exposes the threesome's souls through their esoteric bantering, with topics ranging from metaphysical semantics and predestination vs. freewill, then theological wrangling over the power of a superior being and the very meaning of life…It all leads to a highly charged finale, the resolution of which proves completely wrenching." — Hollywood Reporter

"…intricacies of faith—as well as issues of sexuality, love and loss—are addressed in this provocative and moving new play…a refreshing take on the overlap between religion and homosexuality." — TheaterMania.com

"…this elegantly written play by the American Keith Bunin is a delightful surprise. It is a most engaging mix of human interest and religious debate, wry humour and complex relationships. Never preachy and claiming no answer to the age-old challenge of reconciling a benevolent god with human suffering, Bunin instead reconciles elevated dialogue with earthy characterisation." — Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)

About the Playwright:

Keith Bunin is a New York based playwright and screen writer. He is a graduate of Goddard College and Columbia University, and he lives in Brooklyn.