Recommended by Audrey Lang

This story of a complicated family includes deliciously creepy scares and deliciously authentic relationships. A fun read—but I’d love even more to see it produced and watch this exciting play come to life onstage!

Nick Malakhow has a way of revealing humanity when he writes, and this play is no exception to that. Every character has such a depth and you want to keep spending time with them, even as you cringe when they hurt each other. I love this honest look at teenage characters, which doesn’t judge them, and takes them all as people in an extraordinary way.

A powerful look at race, sexual orientation, and isolation in a privileged school setting. I love that as present as the white, privileged voices around Sasha and Raymond are via text messages, they are the two characters whose story is placed centrally (as they are the only two characters we see or hear from directly onstage). This conveys a clear and direct sense of the environment they are living and learning in while giving the reader or audience a focused look at their specific pain and loneliness in a world where they are the "others."

I just watched "Masculinity Max" in Pride Plays and I am so taken with this gorgeous play. I laughed, I almost cried and found myself trying not to--an interesting and revelatory moment to have in my experience of this particular play. I gained a deeper understanding of what it means to be trans from this play, but more importantly, I felt myself, a cis lesbian, relating to every character and understanding gender in a new way. I need to see this play produced and I'd also love to see it become required reading in theatre and gender classes.

A PICTURE OF TWO BOYS is most beautiful to me in the moments that feel ugliest. It is an important look at trauma, the deep and painful shame that is found when the feelings surrounding a trauma are not the feelings you're "supposed" to have about that experience, and the struggles of friendship when one of the most significant things connecting you may be that trauma. I believe this play will change the lives of young men fortunate enough to play Pete and Markey and young audience members alike.

I love the way that both this play and its protagonist, Jason, are gentle without losing any assertiveness. Even in their moments of misunderstanding and anger, each character has care for the others--of course that's not a necessity for any play, but it's a beautiful part of humanity that I appreciate Malakhow's choice to depict. I loved the journey that SEEING EYE took me on and would love even more to experience a production!

"Alice in Therapy" is such a fun take on the story of "Alice in Wonderland" that we all know. It parodies both that story and the psychology of Freud very effectively, and I can imagine the many, many laughs it would get in just four short pages in performance!

This was such an exciting play to read, unlike any I've experienced before! I was simultaneously relating deeply to certain parts of the school/teacher/student experiences depicted, as well as the interview experience, and in the next moment would be surprised or shocked in the best way by a totally different way of looking at a situation than I'd ever considered before. "Arise" took me on a journey with painful moments and humorous ones, all very intriguingly crafted.

I have been absolutely obsessed with this play since seeing the WP Theater production! It's a play I wish I'd had as a teenager but am so very grateful to have now as a young woman--both to think on in my womanhood and to look up to as a playwright seeking to create female stories. I loved how truthful the dialogue felt to the way teenage girls speak--I never had any doubt that was who I was watching, particularly thinking of the rapport they had with each other. I can't wait to see how the life of this play continues!

I saw the Kitchen Theatre's production of this play in Ithaca, NY, and was struck by the deeply human, sometimes painful, consistently touching way that it moves through two lives that coexist with one another. Max and Diana's relationship was one that felt so specifically and uniquely defined, and yet one that I recognized too, and appreciated for both of those qualities.