Recommended by Nick Malakhow

This wrenching piece captures something about living with an ED that most narratives on the topic fail to truly communicate--the heartbreaking ways one's illness infects, informs, and shapes their relationships with others and how that compounds loneliness and isolation. We see the haunting, metaphorical Everywoman have direct negative impacts on Mel; we also see Mel navigate a minefield of triggers and trauma in everyday interactions with people who, ostensibly, care greatly for her, but whose very existence brings trouble for her. This collage of slim, harrowing scenes is potent, and nuanced. Such excellent work!

Wow! SPOOKFISH is a brilliant mash-up of horror/slasher films, absurdism, and brutalism that proves to be a wild ride from start to finish. It is also a structural master-class--beginning with a hilarious and lively hook of a first act before ramping up the stakes and the insanity and ending with a contemplative and gutting finale. Haygen-Brice Walker shows a unique facility for utilizing tropes of disparate genres to create a chaotic yet cohesive aesthetic whole. This piece is also a great example of substance with style as Walker explores/explodes trauma, shame, human cruelty, sexuality, and social dominance within.

PLAINCLOTHES presents us a cast of multi-dimensional, exceptionally well-rendered individuals with potent needs, flaws, and motivators. Each member of the large ensemble is distinctly-voiced and speaks with the uneven rhythms of natural speech. Davis explores identity, the lengths we go to protect ourselves or our loved ones, and privilege with such an astute eye towards intersectionality, it's hard not to empathize with the conflicting perspectives on display. This is an absolutely hilarious piece with some well-timed and well-earned gut punches to its beloved characters. Spectacular work and a good showcase for a diverse, talented ensemble!

This hilarious and clever satire was a joy to read from start to finish. Lazarus does an excellent job of establishing an absurd theatrical world from the first moments of the script and deftly explores a number of issues, the most potent of which being the right to life debate. The blobular, exceedingly funny embryos are a perfect and absurd theatrical conceit used to comment on Mommy's societally-driven frantic obsession with having a biological child of her own as a way of validating her role as a mother and woman. This play should reach a wide audience!

This hilarious piece is the perfect balm to forgetting about the bizarre present at the moment! Hageman creates several supremely distinct and unique characters here--based partially off mobster movie archetypes. In working with this conceit, she both delivers some hilarious and immensely readable dialogue, while also using a tongue-in-cheek manner to comment on the way social structures play out among little kids. Would be a great piece for a strong ensemble and perfect for schools.

What a sweet slice of life that captures the phenomenon of two disparate strangers connected over a shared feeling in a complete organic and natural way. Al and Walt sound distinct and believable and very three-dimensional for folks in a ten minute piece! The revelations are effectively foreshadowed, but poignant when they happen.

This was a fast-paced and thrilling, and adaptation of "Romeo and Juliet." Davila created characters that felt both like the familiar archetypes to be recognizable, while still being wholly fresh, original, and nuanced individuals in and of themselves. Adan and Julio have the youthful impulsiveness of the legendary couple, but their problems here are clearly compounded and more poignant with the intersectional eye towards their queerness. Like "Romeo and Juliet," this reads as not an epic love story, but as a scathing critique of how socio-cultural and political structures created by dysfunctional adults impact generations of youth to come.

I tore through this haunting, lyrical piece in one sitting! Henry has, at once, crafted a unique and well-rendered theatrical world, while also utilizing the structures and rules of that world as part of a brilliant metaphor for grief, trauma, loss, and the resulting mental health fallout of those things. Julian is a really compelling central figure, and I loved how her character was revealed through propulsive jumps back and forth through time. This is also a play that could serve equally well as an elaborate designer's dream and/or a resourceful/scrappy production company's creatively staged small show.

What a clever, sharp, funny, and insightful exploration of masculinity and identity in general! Bavoso has created a hilarious, well-defined, and nuanced collection of characters with distinctive voices and perspectives. In utilizing the heightened emotions of adolescents, he so cleverly and openly comments upon the ways we define, limit, and internalize masculinity and gender identity later in life. The dramatic Mikey provides much material for laughter both in his interactions with his campmates as well as through the play-within-a-play conceit that works so effectively here. This would be a valuable play for everyone to see/do/discuss. Great teen roles!

Wow! What a propulsively-paced, compelling piece led by two incredibly dynamic and fully-realized characters. The play begins with a startling and theatrical diptych of worship which serves as the perfect spring board to the journey Gabi and Manuel undergo. Seinuk explores trauma and its after-effects, faith and its identity-shaping power, and family with great nuance and depth. The particular identity intersections of the central characters lend complexity, heft, and specificity to these very universal themes and ideas. The twists and turns were consistently surprising and never gimmicky. I'd love to see this powerful play on its feet!