‘Primary Trust’ Could (and Should) Go Bigger on Joy

Back in the days before social media offered connections to the outside world, growing up Black in a distant little town in western New York probably didn’t offer the best head start one might wish for. In Eboni Booth’s Primary Trust, Kenneth has that and other big obstacles to overcome as a young adult in the fictional town of Cranberry.

An émigré from The Bronx, Kenneth’s mom worked at a bank, so poverty wasn’t piled on top of the racism he encountered in his early years at school. When Mom suddenly died, 10-year-old Kenneth was faced with harsh trauma, the town’s child protective agency, a social worker and life in an orphanage followed by stints in foster care, where his isolation and exposure to racism were only magnified.

Booth’s script, the 2024 Pulitzer Prize winner for drama, doesn’t specify what illness or ailment has resulted from Kenneth’s deprivations and hardships. So in Three Bone Theatre’s current production at The Arts Factory, director Tiffany Bryant-Jackson and Miles Thompson, tackling the role of Kenneth, must chart their own path.

From the beginning, there are hesitations, silences and restarts as Kenneth eases into the story of how he has changed over the past six months. While these crucial events in our narrator’s life happened before smartphones, according to the script, neither of the playbills — printed or online — disclose the period. If autism is what we would call Kenneth’s condition, we are taken back to a time when ASD and the autism spectrum hadn’t matriculated into widespread awareness.

One of the townspeople we meet tells Kenneth that he reminds him of his brain-damaged brother, but at Wally’s Tiki Hut, Kenneth’s favorite place in the world, wait staff see him as a man of mystery, sitting alone in his corner every evening at happy hour, sipping mai tais. They have a pool going on what he does for a living.

On Hoo-Ray Thursdays, Wally’s offers two-for-one mai tais. But Kenneth always orders two for starters. The second drink is for his imaginary friend, Bert, introduced to us early in the action. What little I’ve read about the imaginary friends of autistic people indicates that they can actually help develop stronger social skills.

As Kenneth’s narrative unfurled, Bert’s helpfulness appeared somewhat preternatural at times. Can an imaginary friend calm you down when you’re losing your shit? Can he provide key coaching and prompting at a job interview? Impressive, this Bert.

Booth seems to situate Kenneth a bit north of Elwood P. Dowd, James Stewart’s character in the 1950 film Harvey, on the awareness spectrum, as Kenneth at least knows that it isn’t cool to introduce your imaginary friend to other people. This is one of the spots where Booth’s narrative scheme gets a bit loopy, because Kenneth is introducing Bert to us while bypassing the rest of Cranberry.

At odds with the loopiness surrounding him, Miles Thompson immerses himself deeply in Kenneth’s inwardness; there’s nothing halfway when his frustrations and anger break loose. Thompson’s hold on his character and his immersion in his story were as stunning and convincing as any work we’ve seen onstage in recent years.

Yet I found myself almost completely unmoved by his drama. Maybe it’s my own proximity to the subject matter, having lost my younger brain-damaged sister within the past year and having first-hand contact with autistic people, also with a gift-buying intimacy. What may strike other audience members as freshly poignant or revelatory didn’t land hard with me.

For others, Frandasia Williams’ multitude of shenanigans as multiple waiters, waitresses and bank customers may increase empathy for Kenneth or provide a needed lightening of the mood. Quite a gallery, to be sure, though the bank customers struck me as more lifelike, cherry-picked from a multitude, than the waiters and waitresses, who were a multitude in themselves — suggesting either an epidemic of turnover at Wally’s or a Tiki Hut the size of a vast circus tent.

Dubious numbers of wait staff aside, Booth may be suggesting that Kenneth’s view of — and attention to — other people is evolving. At the beginning of this six-month transformation, Kenneth, at age 38, is sufficiently content working his dead-end job at Sam’s Bookshop. If my math is accurate, he’s been there for 20 years, ever since he aged out of foster care. 

He’s good enough at math to help with the bookkeeping, sweep the floors and do other chores, and Sam is satisfied with Kenneth’s work and even tolerates him hanging with Bert.

“As long as you don’t steal from me, you can talk to whatever voices you want,” Sam lays out. 

After his daily work grind, there’s Kenneth’s relaxation grind at Wally’s with mai tais and Bert. Sam and the blur of waiters and waitresses at Wally’s are all the human contact that Kenneth needs. 

None of them seems to be a people person, including Sam, the first of Tim Huffman’s three tasty roles. Sam doesn’t know how to break it to Kenneth that failing health is forcing him to shutter his store, so he has procrastinated until the final weeks.

With only an envelope of severance money to tide him over, Kenneth can’t rely on Bert to help him. Perhaps this is where Bryant-Jackson and Thompson took the wrong path to my emotions. They seem to view Kenneth as a man who needs help rather than as a late bloomer with hidden survival skills and potential.

Yes, it is Corrina who emerges as Kenneth’s first human helper in 20 years, allowing Williams to deliver a fully fleshed character. But that happens only when Kenneth sees the new waitress as something other than a cartoon caricature and launches a mildly personal conversation with somebody other than Bert or Sam. He is reaching out to her first before she delivers her golden tip.

While Williams suddenly evolves onstage, Kenneth’s subtle progress must also manifest; Booth doesn’t make it any easier for Thompson to delineate Kenneth’s growth. On the contrary, by having Kenneth narrate his story to us, a roomful of total strangers, he telegraphs the fact that he will succeed in conquering his steepest challenges: communicating and confiding with real people.

No, the problem isn’t as impossible here as it would be if the formerly deaf, dumb and blind Helen Keller were narrating the story of The Miracle Worker, but you can see the parallel. That William Gibson play about Keller’s teacher, Annie Sullivan, reliably delivers an emotional wallop.

The lesson to be applied here is to take Sullivan’s attitude of not succumbing to pity. Instead, follow The Miracle Worker’s lead in emphasizing Kenneth’s victories, big and small. Go bigger on joy! More enthusiasm. More celebration. Whether or not Kenneth exceeds our expectations, it should be clear that he has exceeded his own.

Neither of the triumphal scenes here can rival the water pump scene in The Miracle Worker, but they can certainly be celebrated with far more spontaneity, zest and joy than Bryant-Jackson is allowing here. Liberating Kenneth to be really happy and normal would become a potent antidote to all the wry, plastic, stale and ironic references to happy hour that come before.

A bigger Kenneth would provide Williams with a chance to expand a little as Corrina and for Marvin King to make Bert, already the ideal social worker, even heartier. King appears to be as mighty physically as he is rigorous in his coaching duties.

I wouldn’t mind seeing Thompson jump into King’s arms the first time he has good news. Or for this prodigiously gifted imaginary friend to lift Kenneth high in the air. Other Berts might not be able to muster the strength, but we’re confident that King can.