Fresh off Tony win, Chicago playwright serves up 'Donuts'

Tracy Letts has earned some time off.

For more than a year, "August: Osage County," his blistering dysfunctional family drama that took first Chicago and then New York by storm, has occupied much of his time.

It was time well spent.

In April, "August" earned Letts the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for drama. In May, the Steppenwolf Theatre production received seven Tony Award nominations. Earlier this month, it won five, including a Best Play award for Letts. Meanwhile his latest, "Superior Donuts," began previews last week at Steppenwolf.

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Letts began working on "Donuts" about the time "August" went into production. He was revising it the day he won the Pulitzer, and the final technical rehearsals coincided with the Tony Awards ceremony.

And on Sunday - two weeks to the day that his last play took Broadway's top prize - "Superior Donuts" opens.

Following up the prize winner invariably puts pressure on a playwright. And the 42-year-old Letts knows as well as anyone how quickly cheers can turn to jeers.

"I've psyched myself up for it and psyched myself out for it," says Letts. "For a long time I talked about 'Superior Donuts' in the diminutive: 'It's a little comedy set in a doughnut shop. It's a palate cleanser.' Only in recent days have I said 'this is a good play' and stand behind it. It's a better and more important work than I gave it credit for."

But if a backlash comes, he's prepared for it.

"There's all that talk about (critics) building you up so they can tear you down," he says. "That's the clichÃcirc;©, but I don't think it's necessarily true."

Not for Letts, who has emerged as something of a critic's darling this year, picking up New York Drama Critics Circle and Drama Desk awards in addition to the Tony and Pulitzer.

Set in a rundown doughnut shop in Chicago's Uptown neighborhood, "Superior Donuts" marks the first time Letts has set a play in Chicago.

"All the other plays are set in the plains where I come from," says the Oklahoma-born writer. "I was interested in exploring my adopted city. I've lived here for 20 years, I thought it was time I started to visit where I am now."

After "August," Letts wanted to tackle something on a smaller scale.

The result was a comedy that centers around the conflict between the cautious owner of the failing shop (Michael McKean) and his sole employee (Jon Michael Hill) who wants to make changes that might save the business. Less grand than "August," it embodies some of the same issues and conflicts, most of them having to do with family - a subject rife with conflict and especially well-suited to drama.

"That's the topic," says Letts, "your blood family or the family you create. That's something every person has in common."

"Like every thinking person, I'm concerned with the state of our nation and as a result, the state of our community," he continues. "But I'm interested in exploring those things on a smaller, more personal level."

And he's interested in exploring them here, even though New York and Los Angeles will surely beckon him. L.A. beckoned once before and Letts responded. But after four years, he returned to Chicago and in 2002, he joined the Steppenwolf ensemble. Recently named an artistic associate, his position there is one other playwrights would envy insofar as it accommodates his passion for writing and acting. Last year he spent four months playing the wronged husband in Harold Pinter's "Betrayal." All told, he's acted in 13 Steppenwolf productions, including Martin McDonagh's "The Pillowman," Bruce Norris' "The Pain and the Itch" and Ronald Harwood's "The Dresser."

Lately, acting has taken a back seat to writing. He has a couple of projects in the works, including a new play for California's South Coast Repertory, an adaptation of Anton Chekhov's "Three Sisters" for a small theater company in Portland and eventually, the screenplay for "August," which goes international in November when it opens at London's National Theatre.

But first, he plans to take a break and recharge his batteries.

No one can say he hasn't earned it.

"Superior Donuts" opens Sunday at 1650 N. Halsted St., Chicago. (312) 335-1650 or steppenwolf.org.