Broadway Donuts via “Spinal Tap” Taste Good

The best play to see right now on Broadway: Tracey Letts’s’ “Superior Donuts” It’s superior in every way.

Letts wrote the award-winning “August: Osage County,” which was much different, a classic drama about a family.

“Donuts,” however, is a laugh out loud comedy. Last night, on a Tuesday night of all things, when Broadway is usually sleepy, I got a kick out of listening to the “Donuts” audience burst into laughter over and over.

And why not? Michael McKean, best known from “This Is Spinal Tap,” the Christopher Guest movies, and as Lenny (his partner was Squiggy) on “Laverne and Shirley” plays the owner of a well established Chicago lunch counter. He’s also a widower with a sad past, but he makes great donuts. Jon Michael Hill makes his stunning Broadway debut as’ Franko, a 21 year-old black kid who comes to work for McKean’s Arthur and changes his life with a fresh perspective. The play is about family and friendship; it’s deceptively simple, but it resonates.

Last night we got another treat ”Marilyn Dodds Frank, sister of well known journalist Allan Dodds Frank (CNN, Bloomberg. The Daily Beast) ‘ made her debut as understudy to fluish Jane Alderman. Alan brought his twin 15 year-old daughters to kvell over Aunt Marilyn. Brava!