Mar 4-29, 2026
Tickets available at here
By EBONI BOOTH
Directed by JEFFREY LO
Kenneth, a 38-year-old bookstore clerk, spends his evenings sipping mai tais at the local tiki bar. However, when sudden unemployment jolts him from his comfort zone, Kenneth begins to face a world he has long avoided. Thanks to the unexpected kindness of those he meets along his journey, he begins to shatter the barriers of his solitude, awakening to the vibrant world around him for the very first time. A tender, insightful, and humorous narrative.
2024 Pulitzer Prize winner for Drama
Review by Steven Murray for Broadway World
TheatreWorks and director Jeffrey Lo must have been licking their chops with the chance to produce the regional premiere of Eboni Booth’s Pulitzer Prize winning Primary Trust. In Lo’s skillful hands, and with a seasoned powerful cast, Primary Trust is a winner – both deeply emotional and full of hope…
With some clever lighting and sound cues by Steven B. Mannshardt and Gregory Robinson respectively, Lo creates both the tension of anxiety and the glimmers of escape from that emotional jail. Anxiety disorders are the world’s most common mental health issue and Primary Trust beautifully explores the aspects of one man’s climb out of despair into a world of new connection.
Review by Michael J. Vaughn for Mountain View Voice
To call Eboni Booth’s Pulitzer-winner “heartwarming” only gets us about halfway there. Let’s call it heart-restoring. TheatreWorks and director Jeffrey Lo have given the work an imaginative, whimsical telling that tickles all the feels as well as working out the cerebellum and the empathy muscles.
The initial setup is a show unto itself. Playing Kenneth, William Thomas Hodgson has that particular “it” quality of instant likeability. He steps out on a gargantuan Chamber of Commerce map of Cranberry, New York (a suburb of Rochester), to give a TED Talk on his beloved town. Christopher Fitzer’s innovative set lights up with little Google Map-style icons as Kenneth boasts of a grocery store, two banks, a bookstore, and a tiki lounge called Wally’s.