Recommended by Lainie Vansant

A much-needed monologue that gives children a model of kindness and the power to stand up for what's right.

Salsbury's haunting tale calls its audience out on its complacency and gives its young heroine incredible agency. It is poetry meeting reality, waiting for a final compromise.

This haunting play is sci-fi at its best - it has a fully fleshed-out world without having to be about the world-building. Big, imaginative ideas fit into a single set and very practical staging, leaving us to focus on the fascinating characters that Adams has created.

It's fun to see these characters pushed until their calm exterior cracks - Hageman deftly navigates the twists and turns of the relationship, explores moral questions, and builds a dystopian world, all in just ten minutes!

Hageman captures the young voice so compassionately in this monologue. Not just the way that young people talk, but the way that today's young people use dark humor and their own style of speaking to talk about their very real pain. She lets this young lady talk about self harm in a way that is neither melodramatic nor "edgy" - it's only honest and kind and real.

Daley-Sharif asks big questions with a sense of humor in this short play about sweet, dumb kids who start something bigger than themselves. I really enjoyed her use of transitions, using well-placed theatricality to catch the audience up on the play's history and move us from point to point in the story at hand.

So fun and energetic, specific in it's time period and genre, and a great slice of will they/won't they. It's a riot!

An imaginative play that asks new questions (at least new-to-me questions) about what to do in the wake of an act of violence. This play deals with anger and injustice and the brokenness of our world but doesn't get so caught up in those things that it loses the humanity of its characters. Plus, it's a theatrical delight for designers, actors, and directors with an important message to boot.

Fun throughout, followed by a heart-breaking turn at the end, asking a bigger question than we expect: What is it we really want, after all?

Huang does a beautiful job balancing beautiful mystery and harsh reality in this lovely piece. It's hopeful and lovely while still acknowledging the nastiness of life. A treasure.