Recommended by Scott Sickles

We carry our lives in our bones. In our souls. In our DNA.

Then that DNA and those souls are passed down to form the bones of the next generation.

In the midst of all that is the present. Most days, what lives within us stays there, quiet, dormant… and sometimes waiting. In the now, our past lurks to strike in the future. Then there are those intimate D-Days where it all explodes, implodes, and ultimately lingers.

Feriend’s memoir is a testament to endurance, internal and external, intrusive and welcome, forging hope without forgetting. Elegant work!

First, this is a textbook example of well-crafted, active exposition. Seriously, it needs to be studied as such. Neither character says anything the other already knows for the audience's benefit. They're too busy dealing with the current situation: a wedding where they know only one person.

A lot of history and emotion bubbles under the surface here. Cole uses the social setting to keep the ice solid beneath get characters' feet as long as possible. The emotions are genuine and relatable. Sometimes venting only alleviates so much pressure and this scene... It pops!

O, from the mouths of babes...

These two young girls know too little about some things and too much about others, which for the purposes of this play is juuust right! They already understand one of the most important things: that love is not too be interfered with!

Cole paints a sweet, funny, and knowing portrait of young queer love. In a country that's trying to erase queerness, she gives us two girls who are indelibly so.

What a roller coaster! But damn, this ride is rickety! It wobbles at the turns, whipping you about and slamming you together, until you throw your hands in the air and scream with glee.

A beautiful progression as Chip and Brett meet for the second time! Heyman skillfully shows us who they are while keeping their inner identities from each other. As Brett lowers his walls Chip reinforces his own. The conflict is engaging and infuriating. The setups are sublime and the payoffs abound. The advent of something beautiful occurs and we feel lucky to have witnessed it. Wheeee!

Ibsen and Prillaman: two great tastes...

Prillaman takes the spirit of AN ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE combines it with a simple everyday warning, Keep off the Grass, and fashions a functional analogy that terrorizes with a light touch while taking no prisoners.

There's an elegant sense of dread hanging over the proceedings because you know Emerson is right and it's just a matter of time before others realize it, likely at their peril. The final moment is taut, quietly infuriating, and leaves you dying to know what's next... hence, it sticks the landing. Simple and stirring.

Utterly zany fun that starts you out smiling, gets you chuckling, then blindsides you with a few good guffaws before making you slap your own head and cry out “noooo…. You did not.” At least that was my journey and what a journey it was!

Jordan and Lord David are great characters in and of themselves and Dzubak keeps the tropes and turns coming faster and furious..er! You will never think of Michigan the same way again.

I’m both excited and terrified to see what a sound designer does with this! I can’t wait to see what a director with a good sense for ground plans does to create this setting (an unfinished house) which needs to be simultaneously realistic and impressionistic.

That said, the play is nuts! Marchant gets us off and running with the character descriptions! What begins as a kind of intergeneration comedy – sorta FAMILY TIES on acid – becomes increasingly yet stealthily more bizarre. And we just roll with it until there’s no turning back. Great sleight of hand!

The onstage slow motion tumble down the hill brings to mind Tim Conway’s old man falling in slow motion down the stairs. If something remind people of classic Tim Conway, you’re off to a great start!

The play transition from physical comedy to verbal, cleverly incorporating the nursery rhyme in a 911 call that also takes a turn! It a delightfully crafted take on Jack and Jill and even a great send up of people who should’ve have called 911 but did anyway!

Fun for actors, audiences, and especially the choreographer!

A fascinating shadow play/sexual pantomime about sexual initiation. If only everyone could get this kind of guidance their first time. While we only see their silhouettes, we hear their excitement, passion, patience, and personalities. Even though they don’t have names, the are very distinct individuals. Weaver brings out their different desires and expectations with honestly and compassion.

The gaming world, both playing and design, is notorious hellscape for women. In fact, it’s a two-for – death threats, misogyny, abuse, harassment, and sexual assault are ubiquitous in both the real world and the virtual. Wyndham poses fascinating questions in a brutal environment where safety - virtual and real - is all in your imagination. Especially chilling is the person in the real-world room so immersed in the digital world, they missed something they should have borne witness to in the physical world. Actual or virtual, violation is real. This piece calls it out!