Superior Donuts

11/10/10 - 12/19/10

WRITTEN BY TRACY LETTS
DIRECTED BY SERGE SEIDEN

Arthur Przybyszewski, a burnt-out hippie whose guilt over avoiding military service has alienated everyone he loves, has little interest in life anymore. Even an act of vandalism to his donut shop, Superior Donuts, which outrages his irascible neighbor Max, an ambitious Russian immigrant with designs on purchasing the shop, fails to bring Arthur out of his haze. However, when a charismatic young African-American man named Franco Wicks talks his way into a job, Arthur begins to recover his spark. He begins paying attention to the female police officer with a crush on him, connects with the local homeless woman who stops in for free donuts and encourages Franco’s goal of publishing the next Great American novel. When Luther Flynn, a middle-aged gangster, and his thug Kevin confront Franco about an outstanding debt, Arthur takes the matter into his own hands.

Studio’s Subscription Season is the core of our programming, offering an uncommonly rich repertoire of provocative contemporary writing from around the world and inventive stagings of contemporary classics.

Play Name

The inaugural 2010-2011 season of new Artistic Director David Muse was generously underwritten by Jaylee Mead, and Robert and Arlene Kogod, with additional underwriting from The Max and Victoria Dreyfus Foundation, Stanley and Rosemary Marcuss, and Vicki and Roger Sant.

This production of Superior Donuts was generously underwritten by Steve and Linda Skalet and Lizbeth Dobbins.



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The Artists

Cast

Production Team

SETTING

Russell Metheny

Russell Metheny has designed more than 50 productions at The Studio Theatre over the past thirty-five years. Some of his Studio Theatre designs include Superior Donuts, American Buffalo, Rock ‘n’ Roll, The Seafarer, Grey Gardens, The History Boys, Shining City, Ivanov, Topdog/Underdog, The York Realist, A Class Act, The Play About the Baby, The Invention of Love, Indian Ink, bash, Far East, The Three Sisters, and The Slab Boys Trilogy. His regional credits include productions at Indiana Repertory Theatre, Great Lakes Theater Festival, Idaho Shakespeare Festival, The Old Globe, Asolo Repertory Theatre, Geffen Playhouse, Dallas Theater Center, Missouri Repertory Theatre, Studio Arena Theatre, Geva Theatre Center, Goodman Theatre, Portland Stage Company, and Weston Playhouse. Recent productions include A Little Night Music, Blithe Spirit, The House That Jack Built, 1776, My Fair Lady, Jekyll and Hyde, Two Gentlemen of Verona. Upcoming productions include Philadelphia, Here I Come! for Asolo Repertory Theatre and 1776 for American Contemporary Theatre in San Francisco, both with director Frank Galati.

(As of March 2013)

LIGHTING

Peter West

Peter West returns to Studio Theatre, where he previously designed Torch Song Trilogy and Superior Donuts. His recent designs include The Importance of Being Earnest with the Shakespeare Theatre Company, Zero Cost House with Pig Iron Theatre Company, and The Mystery of Irma Vep at Red Bull Theater. His work has been seen throughout the United States and in Europe, Japan, and South America in theatres such as the Shakespeare Theatre Company, The Spoleto Festival, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Arena Stage, California Shakespeare Theater, Shakespeare Santa Cruz, PlayMakers Repertory Company, Geva Theatre Center, The Barbican, Denver Center Theatre Company, the Public Theater, New York Theatre Workshop, and the American Dance Festival. He has designed more than 40 productions for the Drama Division of The Juilliard School and has been an adjunct lecturer at Williams College and Brooklyn College. Mr. West is an artistic associate of Red Bull Theater.

(As of September 2014)

COSTUMES

Kate Turner-Walker

Kate Turner-Walker has previously designed costumes for Reasons to Be Pretty, Blackbird, This is How it Goes, Red Light Winter and Fat Pig at The Studio Theatre. Ms. Turner-Walker’s other design credits include How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents, The Little Prince, A Prayer for Owen Meany and A Murder a Mystery and a Marriage at Round House Theatre; Arcadia, Henry IV Part 1, The Tempest, A Midsummer Night's Dream (Helen Hayes Nomination), The Game of Love and Chance, Much Ado About Nothing, Clandestine Marriage and Two Gentlemen of Verona (Helen Hayes Nomination) at the Folger Theatre; Dead Man’s Cell Phone, Vigils, Martha, Josie and the Chinese Elvis, Starving, and many more at The Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company. Ms. Turner-Walker holds an MFA in Costume Design and is a member of United Scenic Artists.

(As of November 2010)

SOUND

Gil Thompson

Gil Thompson designed more than 70 productions at The Studio Theatre over the last 20 years, for which he received six Helen Hays Award nominations.  He was awarded the Helen Hayes Award for The Studio Theatre’s Indian Ink. More recently, his work was heard at The Studio Theatre in Superior Donuts, Moonlight, Rock’n’Roll, Grey Gardens, The Road to Mecca, The History Boys, Shining City, The Pillowman, Souvenir, and A Number. He was sound engineer for The Passion of the Crawford, and he also designed lights and sound for Crestfall, directed by Joy Zinoman, for The Studio 2ndStage. Other credits include Black Milk, Far Away, Privates on Parade and The Invention of Love at The Studio Theatre; Angel’s Voices and Children of the Sun at The Kennedy Center and several productions at the Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company. He has also worked at The Shakespeare Theatre Company, Source Theatre, Horizons Theatre, Theater of the First Amendment and The Opera Camerata of Washington. He is Production Stage Manager for The Christmas Revels and Resident Lighting Designer and Technical Director for Sidwell Friends School.

(As of November 2010)

FIGHT CHOREOGRAPHY

Robb Hunter

Robb Hunter has directed violence for more than 20 Studio productions including Vietgone, The Effect, Hand to God, Bad Jews, Belleville, The Motherfucker with the Hat, Reasons to be Pretty, Invisible Man, Superior Donuts, American Buffalo, Red Speedo (Helen Hayes nomination for choreography) and The Walworth Farce (Helen Hayes nomination). He also directs movement/violence for the Shakespeare Theatre Company, Arena Stage, Woolly Mammoth (where he received a Helen Hayes Award for HIR and nomination for An Octoroon), Signature Theatre, and many others. He is a member of SDC, AEA, SAG/AFTRA, and is a Certified Fight Director for the Society of American Fight Directors. He is on faculty at The Shakespeare Theatre’s Academy for Classical Acting, is the Choreographer in Residence at American University and is a teaching artist for the Studio Theatre Acting Conservatory.

(As of February 2019) 

PRODUCTION STAGE MANAGER

John Keith Hall

Neil McFadden has designed many shows at The Studio Theatre, including Circle Mirror Transformation, reasons to be pretty, Adding Machine: A Musical, Radio Golf, The Seafarer, Blackbird, The Internationalist, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead, This Is How It Goes, Red Light Winter, Fat Pig, Take Me Out, The Cripple of Inishmaan, Topdog/Underdog, and Betty’s Summer Vacation. He was the Resident Sound Designer at Round House Theatre for eleven years. His work has also been heard at Arena Stage, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, The Folger Theatre, Longacre Lea, Olney Theatre Center, Theatre J, WSC-Avant Bard, The Washington Savoyards, and numerous others. A ten-time nominee, he was the recipient of the 1990 Helen Hayes Award for Sound Design for his work on Heathen Valley at Round House Theatre. Neil is also a musician and composer: he has written music and played for many area shows; he also performs regularly with his rock/blues band Mike’s Garage and as a solo acoustic performer.

(As of May 2012)

Press

Four Stars! Studio Theatre is serving up something rich and satisfying with Superior Donuts
METRO WEEKLY
Delivers heartbreaking glimpses of humanity
WASHINGTONIAN