Cast & Creative Team Set for TWO TRAINS RUNNING at Hartford Stage

Hartford Stage has revealed the artistic team for its upcoming production of August Wilson's Two Trains Running directed by Gilbert McCauley. Performances run from January 23 through February 16, 2025 at Hartford Stage. 

August Wilson, the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright of Fences and The Piano Lesson, brings us the world inhabited by the staff and regulars at Memphis Lee's diner in the Hill District of Pittsburgh in 1969. Through these complex and big-hearted characters, Wilson explores the economic and racial turbulence that marked the Civil Rights Era.    

“Wilson's work continues to resonate because of its power to illuminate the shared human experience,” said Melia Bensussen, Artistic Director of Hartford Stage. “Two Trains Running invites us to sit at the table, listen to each other's stories, and reflect on the complexities of history, identity, and hope.” 

“Whenever I approach the work of August Wilson I'm filled with a swirling sense of appreciation, responsibility, and creative challenge,” said director Gilbert McCauley. “This is especially the case with this production of Two Trains Running. This historical meditation on so-called ‘urban renewal' and the shifting ideological ground of Black folk in America in the late 60s as seen through what Mr. Wilson called ‘the blood's memory,' remains all too resonant in our present world and offers us the opportunity to ‘Take a Look in the Mirror.'” 

The cast includes Jerome Preston Bates, Jr. (What Will Happen to All That Beauty?, Contemporary American Theatre; August Wilson's Seven Guitars opposite Viola Davis, world premiere at Goodman Theatre) as Holloway; David Jennings (Tina: The Tina Turner Musical, Broadway; Grammy award nominee, Ain't Misbehavin' 30th Anniversary recording) as Hambone; Rafael Jordan (Ben Gun in the world premiere of runboyrun by Mfoniso Udofia) as Sterling; Postell Pringle (The Hot Wing King, Hartford Stage; Good Night, Oscar with Sean Hayes, Broadway) as Wolf; Taji Senior (Bernarda's Daughters, National Black Theatre; devour., LadyFest 2019 official selection, The Tank NYC) as Risa; Godfrey L. Simmons, Jr. (All My Sons, It's A Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play, Hartford Stage; Artistic Director, HartBeat Ensemble) as Memphis, the steadfast diner owner; and Jeorge Bennett Watson (bulrusher, Berkeley Rep; The Royale, Capital Rep) as West. 

Director Gilbert McCauley is a Full Professor of Theater at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, with over two decades of teaching experience. A veteran director, he has worked Off-Broadway and at renowned regional theaters such as Arena Stage, Goodman Theatre, and the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, directing works by August Wilson, Lynn Nottage, Robert O'Hara, Katori Hall, and Athol Fugard. He has also served as Producing Artistic Director of Oakland Ensemble Theatre and Resident Director at Brown University's Rites and Reason Theatre. McCauley is an alum of the New York Drama League's Directors Project. August Wilson's Two Trains Running is McCauley's Hartford Stage debut. 

The production features Scenic Design by Lawrence Moten, Costume Design by Devario Simmons, Lighting Design by Xavier Pierce, Sound Design by Gregory Robinson, with Intimacy Coordinator Kelsey Rainwater, Voice Coach Cynthia Santos DeCure, and Casting by Alaine Alldaffer and Lisa Donadio. The Production Stage Manager is lark hackshaw, with Adalhia Ivette Hart as Assistant Stage Manager. 

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