Other recommendations touch on the genius of this playwright's poetry, and so I'd love to uplift the rhythm of the language in this piece. Pacing and poetic verse work together in this play with a deeply empathic slam. The increasing speed and intensity generated by the arc of this narrative offers a feeling both jarring and honest about the realities of mass incarceration for Black youth. I saw this piece multiple times at the OOB Festival as a festival coordinator and can't help but also highlight how heart-forward Darius is as a playwright. A must-read and a need-to-see-again.

Great work. Intense, pulls the audience into the piece and never lets us go. Theatrical language, easily producible, unforgettable work. I highly recommend this moving piece about mass incarceration of Black youth, tragic and well crafted. I hope it gets produced everywhere. A must-see.

With soaring, slam-poetry-inflected language and deep empathy, 18 invites us into the hearts and stories of two teenagers whose lives are upended by racist policing and mass incarceration. Buckley’s play challenges us to truly see the victims of a system that disproportionately impacts young men of color by giving voice to their dreams, their fears, their souls.

The use of heightened language in 18 is powerful, revealing truth in a way that only poetry can. Work like this is proof positive that verse drama has a future in American theatre.