Recommended by Nick Malakhow

This play is hi-larious! So fast-paced, I actually couldn't stop reading until I finished. The scenes are tightly written and the piece as a whole impeccably structured. These four characters are all incredibly distinct, unique, and rendered with such nuance and panache. I was also surprised by the disarming tenderness that came through particularly in Joy and Aiden's interactions, as well as some of the moments between Aiden and Charlie. This piece feels highly theatrical, and it would be a treat to see it onstage. I hope I get the opportunity to do so soon.

Lyrical, lush poetry meets spare conversational dialogue. Both of these modes serve to characterize the Preacher and the intriguing landscape of the remainder of the town quite well. I always love creative visual clues in texts to help unpack a text, and the way lines in the two-character exchanges are grouped together quickly and effectively guided my reading of the scenes. I loved how fleshed out the world and town were by just these simple duologues and monologues. Well-drawn themes of compassion and community made this feel like an important and, as others have stated, timeless parable.

What a specific and beautifully drawn portrait of two siblings and their complicated relationships to one another and their dying father. The emotions surrounding how to return to and interact with a hometown that feels farther and farther away from who you are currently is absolutely on point, and the town itself comes alive through strategically chosen supporting characters. New information slowly revealed from the past propels us forward, though even just the sibling's interactions in the present are enthralling. The piece is surprising and disarming even as it reaches its inevitable conclusion.

I love the contemplative, irregular pacing and rhythm of this piece. The transitions between scenes are elegant, theatrical, and wonderfully incorporated into the action. The world is so distinct and established so well with just a few key characters! I also love the universal contemplation of grief, legacy, and moving forward in the digital age.

This is a briskly moving, beautiful piece. I love how the rules and expectations are set up right from the start and, slowly but surely, many of our initial guesses or preconceived notions are subverted. Highly theatrical and oftentimes surprising.

Briskly moving and clever sci-fi parable. Darkly humorous and keeps you engaged with progressive surprises and well-timed expository information. The specificity and uniqueness of the characters combined with the open-endedness of their symbolic weight and meaning makes this a really intriguing piece for a director get their hands on! I hope to see this onstage some time soon!

What a beautiful play that is both tender with and fair to its nuanced teenage characters. Gloriously hilarious at certain points, heartbreaking at others, it is unpretentiously yet consistently profound in scope! The highly theatrical world of wrestling is also seamlessly integrated and so crucial to the piece. I can't wait to see an awesome production of this some day!

What I found most impressive about this wonderful piece was the way in which Mike Solomonson was able to make Celeste's disconnected, hallucinatory, hilarious, heartbreaking, and terrifying journey feel like a powerful and cohesive character arc and work of art. This reads as amazingly theatrical and would be an absorbing and entirely engaging experience as an audience member!

This piece is so brilliant in the way it melds dark satire with both intellectually provocative sentiments and deeply emotional human truths. It incorporates multiple theatrical devices effortlessly. While all the characters were superbly drawn, Needra's journey in particular was navigated with a poignant and pointed metaphorical exploration of ingrained cultural trauma and identity formation. Highly theatrical in the best way!

An incisive and wonderfully structured exploration of privilege and of the precarious divide between power and powerlessness that young adults feel as they navigate issues of social justice and identity. With a deeply intersectional cross-section of characters, many perspectives are given their due and equal weight in the thorny, well-drawn, and both humorous and tragic discussions.