Silently Hoping

Silently Hoping by award-winning playwright Iskandar R. Sharazuddin looks at what it means to come from a mixed cultural heritage. A piece exploring identity, class and faith through interpersonal dynamics and character-led writing, it follows a young woman trying to find her place in the world as she delves into Islam’s relationship with queerness and modernity.

Directed by Mingyu Lin, Silently Hoping is an important questioning of identity and multiculturalism told through a unique and personal narrative.

Kalila Masri is a woman on the cusp of thirty and a life-changing decision, will she have a child with her partner, Charlotte? She wants to say yes. She does say yes. But Kalila has always struggled with reconciling her identity as British with being a Muslim. Her mother is concerned she can’t handle it, Charlotte is convinced everything will be fine, and both of them just want Kalila to finally commit to… something. An out of the blue confrontation with her estranged father completely derails Kalila and she is left asking the big existential question: Who am I?

She’s a Londoner, she’s British-Asian, she’s a millennial, she’s fallen in love with a woman, and she’s a Muslim. But what does all that mean and what does she really want? And is it too late to figure that out?