Recommended by Donald E. Baker

Jan Probst is so terrific at creating atmosphere and distinct, recognizable voices. As someone who also grew up in the lake area of northern Indiana, I felt like I knew her people and their speech patterns. They are real and true. I loved this play, in part because I was sure I knew how it would end and it took a turn that left me stunned. Treat yourself to this one!

History is more engaging on stage when large events are seen through individual experience. Mansfield does this beautifully in a play that explores the interpersonal effects of the George Floyd killing on an interracial family in an Indiana town that has inherited the state's dark historical legacy of racism--Klan, lynchings, sunset towns, de facto segregation. That the white father is a policeman and the black teens are old enough to question their place in the family and the world only adds to the tension. This is an important play. Highly recommended.

Brett arrives at college undeclared in more ways than one--his major and his sexuality. But one of those gets declared after he meets Chip, a confident, definitely declared gay man. This is a lovely little play about finding the courage to take the first step to recognizing who one is. It can be read alone or as the first of an eight-play cycle called "Tales from the Hill." I look forward to reading the other seven and seeing where these two engaging characters go from here.

I love plays like this in which the Devil gets a taste of his own medicine, and who better to deliver it than a being as evil as himself, the clerk at the DMV. Nora Louise Syran almost makes one feel sorry for him in this very funny short duologue. Highly recommended!

I loved this nostalgic short play about boyhood friends bound together by a love of baseball and how that love persisted through tragedy and loss. Anyone who has ever played little league or softball or just thrown a game of catch in the back yard can relate to these boys of summers of yesteryear. That they are based on real young men adds another layer of depth to a poignant story.

"The Known Universe" can stand on its own, but do yourself a big favor and read all three plays of "The Second World Trilogy" in order. You will be amply rewarded. I don't use the word "masterpiece" lightly, but that's exactly what Scott Sickles has produced. The plays celebrate love even as humanity faces the consequences of ignoring too many inconvenient truths. The heartbreaking image of a family determined to maintain some semblance of normality while knowing they cannot survive the next few minutes will stay with you forever. I cannot recommend these plays highly enough.

Employees of this nameless company have numbers instead of names, wear uniforms that wipe out all traces of individuality (except, temporarily, on casual shirt Fridays), and are subjected to company meetings on "synergy." They are provided drinks laced with drugs to make their souless jobs tolerable. The work seems like simple data entry but with every click of the "enter" key people die. Some workers can stand it, others cannot. The corporate motto is "what must be done must be done," and what must be done with this wonderfully dark satire is produce it.

"Higher ed has become some kind of capitalist hellscape," Valerie says in this excellent play about the compromises liberal arts professors are called upon to make when which programs survive is determined by cost-benefit analysis. Corrupting academic politics, petty vindictiveness, ethical lapses, blackmail--all kinds of intellectual prostitution are on display, as is the traditional type available at the nearby strip club. Eppich-Harris's well-drawn characters find themselves in soul-sucking workplace situations that may seem all too familiar to people in nearly any profession. Will any of them emerge with their humanity intact? Highly recommended.

I love "what happened next" stories. In this one, a certain beloved children's book character has grown up, although his wardrobe preferences are the same and he still speaks in rhyme. His breakfast food choice is familiar also, and he attempts to serve it to a stranger he met on Grindr. Unfortunately, his high hopes for this assignation are doomed to disappointment. Even so, there's a lot to enjoy in this imaginative short play.

Let's journey back to those thrilling days of yesteryear, growing up gay at midcentury in a small town. Williams pegs it perfectly. The atmosphere of the barbershop on a Saturday morning, discovering your sexuality while ogling the superheroes in the comic books, and learning the painful lesson that the ads at the back of those magazines promised much more than they delivered. The tone is just right, and the script would allow an actor to probe as deeply as he would wish into the character. Delightful!