Recommended by Peter Fenton

[12/26/2024] This play--and I mean this as sincerest compliment--is utterly ridiculous! ("But hey, I'm an open-minded guy") The farce is a misunderstood genre and Mike Byham has shown he's mastered it with George's Day Off. There is so much compounding situational humor with strongly motivated characters, each beat feeding into the next, all wrapped in a compelling time capsule of the late 1980s. I genuinely had no idea where the play was heading and laughed a bunch. Quite fun!

[12/14/24] Come for the masked vigilante superhero parody, stay for the quiet character study in work/life balance, the gripping local newsroom drama, and scathing critiques of late-stage capitalism and smarmy politicians! Adam Richter's deceptively simple Batman/Spotlight mashup play is witty, thought-provoking, and touchingly human. I loved all the literary references sprinkled throughout, and even learned a couple new words from an uptight copy-editor! I'd love to see this one performed live.

[12/9/24] Sometimes hope comes at you from the beyond in the sign of a cardinal pooping on your windowsill! Don Baker has written a charmingly heartwarming two-hander that gives a glimmer of hope for how love can (and should) win over dogma.

[12/8/24] Sam Heyman managed to explore one of the biggest issues I never realized I had with Frosty the Snowman in FAHRENHEIT HO HO HO in a deliciously hilarious, existentially absurd holiday comedy. I loved experiencing an otherwise jolly Santa Claus dropping an F bomb and a lifeless husk of Ray Bradbury coming to life "Happy Birthday!" style, and Mrs. Claus having offstage comments on what Santa should and shouldn't do with his powers. Great fun!

[12/8/24] I'm deeply concerned that Jacquie Floyd-Priskorn has written something we could realistically see happen in the not-so-distant future! Jokes aside, The Baked Alaska Incident is a wonderfully absurd ten-plus minute comedy that escalates what happens when a tech "trillionaire" is denied getting what he wants, and who ultimately will pay for it.

[12/8/24] I greatly enjoyed this spin on the "holiday travel plans fall through" trope; Philip Middleton Williams--as always--evokes great slice-of-life human interaction without treading into any clichéd executions of this trope. This is a scenario of three people staying in the moment with an awareness of what really matters in life, and in--dare I say--the universe.

[11/23/24] How can your heart not go out to Dana? I appreciated this look into dignity, food insecurity, and the lengths we go to to provide the necessities and luxuries for our families—and what goes through the mind of those who think it's their right to "help". I had the great privilege of hearing Jennifer's play read at the Phillip's Mill Emerging Playwrights festival in November 2024!

[11/20/24] Ooh. METAL BIRD is very timely, very terrifying. Rebecca Kane has done an excellent job drawing her characters, one in particular is so humanized it was genuinely unsettling when their true colors revealed. It's a chilling illustration of grooming and gender dynamics, amplifying the horrors by placing it in a mundane (for the rich and famous) setting. Also, don't sleep on Kane's stage directions! She's a master.

[11/17/24] I devoured this play. Vince Gatton has illustrated a beautiful snapshot of what life in one white working-class community looks like in late-stage capitalism taken to a further, gorier, but believable future step with a bone-chilling horror story with exquisitely-drawn, often very funny characters. The ending was one of the most unsettling parts to me, due to its inevitability. This play must be seen on stage soon! Great roles for women of a certain age!

[11/17/2024] I had the great pleasure of seeing this one-woman show back in May when it was performed at Theatre Horizon. In reading her script, I was taken back to the captivating performance I saw on stage. Priyanka's writing is honest, raw, and often very funny. Her ability to illustrate her own experience as an immigrant, as a brown woman, as a person, in one clear narrative hits the mark any memoir author should take note of. It will be especially poignant in the next few years to come.