Review: PRIMARY TRUST is Superb Opener for SpeakEasy Stage Company's 35th Season

When it comes to grieving and loss, closure can be elusive. Indeed, loss can haunt a person for a long time, changing the trajectory of a survivor’s life along the way.

That’s the case for Kenneth, the central character in playwright Eboni Booth’s deeply moving “Primary Trust,” now at Boston’s SpeakEasy Stage through October 11. Winner of the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the one-acter premiered off-Broadway at the Laura Pels Theatre in 2022.

Under the sensitive direction of SpeakEasy Stage’s new artistic director Dawn M. Simmons, the current Boston production is nothing short of exquisite with a superb four-person cast led by David J. Castillo as Kenneth, who, following a traumatic loss as a child, has carefully constructed the emotional equivalent of flood walls around himself in an attempt to manage the erosion of his psyche.

Kenneth’s determinedly unchanged life structure – including days spent working in his home town’s independent bookstore, and nights downing mai tais in the local tiki bar and interacting only with a trusted friend Bert, who exists only in Kenneth’s mind and comes from his hesitancy to make real human connections – allows him to live in carefully guarded ways, strictly within his control. When the bookstore’s closure leaves him out of work, however, he is forced to change his hardened patterns.

He soon finds employment and professional success in the “Primary Trust” bank, where he wistfully recalls that his late mother had worked at a bank for 10 years, forging new relationships with a kindly supervisor and deepening one with a familiar acquaintance from the tiki bar. Kenneth’s re-entry into the broader community of his smalltown home is not without its challenges. Castillo plays his character’s every permutation to perfection in what is likely to be one of the most memorable performances of this season, the perfect match of actor to role.

The supporting actors, benefiting from Booth’s richly rendered script, also give remarkably naturalistic performances. Bert may be imaginary, but Arthur Gomez makes him eminently believable and a friend we would all be lucky to have. Luis Negrón is terrific, too, in a trio of roles that include the independent bookseller, the bank manager and a French-accented sommelier.

The true standout here, however, is Janelle Grace, who nimbly plays a wide range of servers and bartenders at the tiki bar, including Corinna, the most developed of these characters, who becomes a key friend in Kenneth’s new life. She also makes a brief, but impactful appearance as a dissatisfied Primary Trust customer who has a charged encounter with Kenneth. Grace gives each character her own vocal sound, manner, and movement and conveys every layer of meaning in Booth's writing.

That bank scene is but one that illustrates that tearing down walls that one builds to protect and guard the past in order to resume more full community involvement can be a fraught experience.

Even cautiously wading back into life after loss can leave one feeling battered by waves of uncertainty, but as Booth shows with the profound “Primary Trust,” allowing friends and community in, to assuage the loneliness, can be a life saver.