Primary Trust

TheatreWorks’ production of the 2024 Pulitzer-prize winning play, Primary Trust, is beautifully acted, staged and produced. This one-act show with only four actors and one on-stage musician to fill out the town’s-worth of characters, packs in a lot of gut-punching reveals for its 90 minutes, but is ultimately a heart-felt portrait of a man discovering himself through human connection. 

Main character and narrator Kenneth (played by TheatreWorks regular, William Thomas Hodgson) is a socially awkward and chronically anxious 38-year-old living in the small suburb of Cranberry, New York. He works at a book store, he enjoys drinks at the local Tiki bar with his best friend Bert. But everything is not quite as it seems. When the book store shuts down and Kenneth is forced to change up and reevaluate his life, the audience slowly discovers more about Kenneth’s past as he discovers a path toward a future. 

Everything about the show is obviously crafted and placed there with care. Eboni Booth’s award-winning script is packed with humor, grief and empathy. Each of the four actors’ performances are layered and multi-faceted. The set is designed as an enormous map, spread across the stage that depicts the small town where the play takes place, orienting the audience in the tiny world where the story is set. Every element of the show works together flawlessly to create an intimate and heart-wrenching portrait of a man on the fringes of a town that itself is on the fringes of modern-day America. 

With such a small cast, each actor impacts the whole show more than they might in a larger production. Two of the actors play multiple roles while the other two play just one each. Hodgson’s performance as Kenneth is spectacular. Filled with compassion and heart, he grounds the play’s story and emotional moments perfectly. Dan Hiatt, a familiar face to Bay Area theatergoers, plays Kenneth’s two bosses and a hilarious French waiter. His performance is nuanced and delightful every step of the way. Rolanda D. Bell gives an equally impressive performance, juggling the most roles, often transitioning between them while still on stage. Her mastery of accents and physicality gives them each a distinct personality without giving way to easy stereotypes. 

Finally, Kenny Scott as Kenneth’s best-friend Bert is the only other actor to play one role and he does so with effortless panache. Scott does an excellent job of making Bert feel ephemeral, to the extent where I was almost surprised to see him during the final bows. Partially because Scott is on stage less and less as the show goes on and partially because of how well he walks the line between the character’s emotional physical presences. 

Primary Trust is a great play with a small cast that blends humor and tragedy, poignancy with accessibility. The show focuses on a small story—one man’s career change—that sings with universal truths about community, loneliness and love. 

Primary Trust

By Eboni Booth

Through: March 29, 2026

Run time: 90 minutes, no intermission

Where: Lucie Stern Theatre, 1305 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto, CA

Tickets: theatreworks.org, (877) 662-8976