Original research finds a new life on stage
All the Beautiful Things began with research.
In a study published in Pastoral Psychology, BYU communications professor Jessica Zurcher and her colleague Robert Walz examined the experiences of people who had gone through a crisis of faith and later found a way back to religion or spirituality. Their research revealed that there was no single path of return. Instead, participants responded to different kinds of messages and experiences—some centered on resilience and seeking God, some on self-compassion, some on persistence, and others on renewed engagement with scripture. The study ultimately suggested that faith restoration is highly personal and that religious communities should resist a one-size-fits-all approach to those who are struggling.
However, Jessica’s research led her to ask another question: what might happen if these experiences were not only studied, but heard?
Jessica approached faculty in BYU’s Department of Theatre and Media Arts with the possibility of exploring the stories theatrically. That invitation became the starting point for All the Beautiful Things. In 2025 and 2026, Professors Alexandra Mackenzie Johns and Shelley Graham taught two theatre classes dedicated to the project; along with their students, they conducted additional interviews and explored the process of verbatim theatre. The research moved from patterns and categories into individual voices—people describing, in their own words, what it felt like to doubt, to leave, to wrestle, and most importantly, to return.
The result is not an attempt to offer a single explanation for why people come back to faith. Instead, the play preserves what Jessica’s original research made clear: return can look very different from person to person, and those differences can be discovered in stories that are very much worth listening to.
