Recommended by Doug DeVita

  • Winner
    2 Sep. 2019
    Bold, provocative, and shrewdly observed, Amy Berryman’s “Winner” captures the current theatrical landscape with a pithy, honest beauty that both stings and enlightens. Exquisite.
  • AN ECO-FABLE: SOONER THAN YOU THINK (full length)
    2 Sep. 2019
    No one anthropomorphizes better than Robin Rice, and very few can match her for poetic urgency. Both enchanting and devastating, “A Wolf, A Rabbit, and A Crow...” is a fable for our times, and a damn good one at that. A beautifully harsh, ultimately hopeful work of art.
  • HEART OF A WOMAN IN A PRESSURE COOKER: a journey in eight notions by Ephrym Justyce
    2 Sep. 2019
    Bravo. Or is it Brava? Does it matter? Scott Sickles puts the pretentious claptrap of avant-garde theater in his sites, and his aim never falters. At 15 pages, this is a virtual marathon of pretentious claptrappery, a sharply astute, delightfully funny, inventive, and perfectly meta ode to a style of writing one either loves or hates. It’s Sickles’ supreme achievement that with “Woman In A Pressure Cooker...” one can do both simultaneously.
  • Mr. Irresistible
    1 Sep. 2019
    Weaver’s “Mr. Irresistible” is a brilliant short play using a middle-school student’s assignment as a metaphor for censorship and the urge of the uber-controlling to stamp down any spark of creativity that goes against their limited view of the world. Chilling, heartbreaking, and spot on.
  • Meeting Neil
    1 Sep. 2019
    Put a gaggle of gays in a room and tell them an iconic gay celebrity will be joining them, stand back, and watch the fur fly. Everyone is right, no one is wrong, but how much responsibility can an icon actually shoulder before they break? That's the premise of Greg Brisendine's sharply observed, wryly truthful polemic; that he has also made this 10-minute play funny is a bonus.
  • Die, Mr. Darcy, Die!
    31 Aug. 2019
    Fantasy vs. reality, literary heroes vs. the cat-caller on the street... Morogiello's delightfully fizzy romantic comedy takes on Jane Austen with style, flair, and a never-ending barrage of punch lines that do double duty as surefire laughs and stinging social commentary. Pretty much as Austen herself did. Well done, sir.
  • ELEVATOR GIRL
    31 Aug. 2019
    A heady, fast-moving mix of disturbing, challenging, and fun, Hoke's "Elevator Girl" may very well be the paradigm of the modern well-made play.
  • the fucking tent
    31 Aug. 2019
    What a poetic piece of writing; surreal, sad, funny, and genuinely touching, it's so emotionally real it leaves one with an aching sense of longing for what one can and can't have. Delicate, harsh, and beautiful.
  • The Frugal Repast
    30 Aug. 2019
    I saw this at Abingdon Theatre Company in 2007, and I’ve never forgotten the wonderful time I had that afternoon. A smart, delightfully dizzy farce, “The Frugal Repast” offers great roles, a great premise, and actual belly laughs while asking an essentially serious question: who has the right to use your image for their own personal gain? It's a question that's become even more relevant, as people snap away with their smart phones and post the photos all over social media. A paint brush and canvas, a pixel and a screen, tomato, tomahto, "The Frugal Repast" is a theatrical feast.
  • The Goldilocks Zone
    29 Aug. 2019
    What a wonderful piece of writing; funny, touching, warm, sad — from beginning to end, all the planets align in “The Goldilocks Zone,” and everything is just right in the lovely worlds Ian August has created. ❤️

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