TheatreSquared To Debut New Show ‘Superior Donuts’ This Week

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It’s hard to believe, but TheatreSquared’s 2014-15 season will soon wind to a close. But not before the company performs one last critically acclaimed new show by a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright.

The company this week will kick off a string of performances of Superior Donuts, the latest play by Tracy Letts.

“Donuts is crackling good drama, sharply observed, and complete with high stakes, brilliant comedy, and hard-won redemption,” said T2 Artistic Director Bob Ford.

Letts, a native of Tulsa, Oklahoma, is also the author of the award-winning play August: Osage County, winner of the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. He is also an accomplished actor, with a recent role as Senator Andrew Lockhart in seasons 3 and 4 of Showtime’s Homeland.

The show tells the story of Arthur, the deadbeat owner of a run-down donut shop, and Franco, an ambitious teenager hired to work the counter. Between Franco’s big ideas to modernize and the sudden appearance of threatening strangers, Arthur begins to suspect that he’s gotten more than he bargained for — but it may be too late to stop change from coming.

Superior Donuts will be directed by Sean Patrick Reilly (T2’s Hamlet), who is also a member of the play’s original Broadway company.

The cast includes Grant Goodman (Hamlet), Bill Rogers (Sons of the Prophet), Thomas Brazzle (Look Away), Bryce Kemph (Hamlet), Jenny McKnight, Kris Pruett (Reasons to Be Pretty), Nadine Pruvis Schmidt, Ross Stoner and Ryan Brooke Taylor.

Performances are scheduled April 2-26, Thursdays through Sundays, at Walton Arts Center’s Nadine Baum Studios, located at 505 W. Spring St. in Fayetteville.

Tickets range from $15-$40 ($10/Under 30) and are available by calling the Walton Arts Center box office at (479) 443-5600, or online at waltonartscenter.org.