The Unbelievers

The Unbelievers is a new play by the British writer Nick Payne, presented Off-Broadway by Manhattan Theatre Club (MTC) at New York City Center Stage I. It is the play's American premiere. The story first reached an audience in London in 2025, at the Royal Court Theatre, and Knud Adams directs the New York staging. It is an original work, not an adaptation of a book, film or earlier play.

At its center is a family whose son goes missing and the people left to carry on without him. Its big questions are faith and hope, and what it means to keep believing in something that feels impossible. The play jumps back and forth in time, and it leaves room for laughter. MTC describes the evening as touching but also surprisingly funny.

MTC is a nonprofit company founded in 1970, and it grew out of an off-off-Broadway showcase. It produces on Broadway at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre and Off-Broadway at City Center. As of October 2026, MTC counts 31 Tony Awards and 7 Pulitzer Prizes among its productions.

Miriam and David Wright's teenage son, Oscar, disappears before reaching 16. The police investigate, and as the years pass the case stays unsolved. The play follows the family through those years as they work out how to get on with ordinary life.

Miriam refuses to give up hope that Oscar is alive, and she chases false leads. Other people adjust in their own ways. David has a new partner, Lorraine, and her appearance at a family gathering is played mostly for laughs. Margaret Wright has a boyfriend, Benjamin, who is older than she is and who at one point lectures at length about puffins.

Faith runs through the evening. Miriam's first husband, Karl, is now a vicar, and he brings questions of belief into the family's grief. Nancy Khoury, shaken by her brother's absence, experiments with spiritualism.

The scenes are not in chronological order. They range from the first days of the police inquiry to a point seven years on, when David raises the idea of a memorial.

Payne builds the play on shifting time. Rather than telling the story in sequence, he moves between the early days after the disappearance and the years that follow, a structure that recalls his earlier play Constellations.

The New York production adds original songs by Will Butler. Butler belonged to the band Arcade Fire until 2022, and their album The Suburbs won the 2011 Grammy for Album of the Year. He also wrote the music for the play Stereophonic, work that brought him two Tony nominations, one for his score and one for his orchestrations. He shared an Oscar nomination for the score of the film Her.

Stage I is a 299-seat Off-Broadway theater in the basement of City Center. For this production, on-stage seating is available, and the staging uses haze. Several actors double roles: police officers appear alongside characters such as Lorraine, Mia Olsson and Anil Singh.

As of October 2026, Lauren Ambrose plays Miriam Wright and Tom Riley plays David Wright. Ambrose played Claire Fisher in the HBO series Six Feet Under from 2001 to 2005 and was nominated for a Tony Award as Eliza Doolittle in the 2018 Broadway revival of My Fair Lady. Riley appeared on Broadway in Arcadia and played Leonardo da Vinci for three seasons in Da Vinci's Demons.

As of October 2026, Hadi Tabbal plays Rev. Karl Khoury, Nina Ross plays Nancy Khoury, Jack DiFalco plays Benjamin and Elizabeth Yeoman plays Margaret Wright. Tabbal was the original Omid in the Broadway production of English. Ross played Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird on Broadway, and DiFalco has appeared on Broadway in The Ferryman and Torch Song.

As of October 2026, Jaspal Binning, Brittany Bradford and Marjan Neshat each play two parts. Binning is PC Jay Shah and Anil Singh, Bradford is PC Angela Fisher and Mia Olsson, and Neshat is DC Elizabeth Hawkins and Lorraine. The play marks Binning's MTC debut.

The play had its world premiere at the Royal Court Theatre in London, in the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs, with performances from October 10, 2025 through November 29, 2025 and a press night on October 20, 2025. The Royal Court produced it with Playful Productions, and Marianne Elliott directed. It was the first time a Payne play premiered on the Royal Court's main stage.

In London, Nicola Walker played Miriam and Paul Higgins played David. Walker is an Olivier Award winner. Bunny Christie designed the set, which included a glassed-off area at the back where characters who were not in the scene sat waiting.

MTC announced the play on March 17, 2026, as one of the first two titles of its 2026–27 season. Payne said he was glad the US premiere would be at MTC, where his experiences with Constellations and Incognito had been good ones. The New York run began previews on October 13, 2026, with opening night set for November 5, 2026.