Recommended by Asher Wyndham

A great introduction to Gonzalez's work, an appetizer for his longer work 'Even Flowers Bloom in Hell, Sometimes.' Gonzalez is one of those playwrights that refuses to play it safe, his work is on the pulse of America -- in the case of this play, gentrification and the long-term consequences of systemic racism on minorities. Gonzalez isn't like a reporter at a distance from his subjects and issues, he writes from the corner of his America. He's witness. He's a chronicler. So you can't ignore that. Enough with escapist theatre that doesn't show the ugly and ask tough questions.

This Theatre for Social Change play for young audiences is quirky and cute, no doubt. It could also make a difference for kids who live near shores, encourage them to stand up and give voice in support of crabs and other sea creatures -- all of Earth's creatures on land and in water. The smallest actions, like not taking shells or trashing the shores, can make a big difference! From a design perspective, this play would be a fun challenge -- sound and lighting effects of waves, shell-costumes, oversized human trash bigger than than the human actors. Highly recommended!

You might not know the big meaning of your life, but the simpliest pleasures - a newborn, a submarine sandwich at sunrise, fill-in-the-blank - the surprising moments of being alive surrounded by beauty - can get you through life. That's the lesson in this powerful play. The unnamed man may represent the common person of late-stage capitalism (did he lose his job, his money? who knows), may embody the despondency and depression that many of us are feeling right now in Trump's America. Whatever he represents, the homeless man is the antithesis: he offers Hope. Check out this beautiful play.

Adriano Cabral has brought to the page and (hopefully soon) the stage a voice and body we rarely see - or, maybe have never seen - an injured employee declined for Worker's Comp. Her words, spoken with deep-down-anger, is a rant against not just her employer but modern America's capitalist system that sees employees as dispensable, as robots, even if they are good at their job. This monologue doesn't just speak for many factory or industrial workers today, it speaks for them tomorrow -- and their rights that may be jeopardized under a Trump Administration. Poetic, fierce, dynamic monologue.

This. This monologue speaks to many of us -- the marginalized, the disenfranchised, the disenchanted, the abused, the neglected, those living in fear of the future in Trump's America. This slam poetry as a solo spectacle or a multi-character play crossed between a choreopoem and Kane's 4.48 Psychosis is a must-read, it must be produced -- it does more that bring to the stage the depressed and dispirited state of minority classes and groups -- it inspires home and change through tough love -- and words that slam against our ignorance and passivity, forcing us to start the revolution now.

No zombies attack in this play, they're outside the storage container, but it's still a frightening read. Because you know at any moment something could happen -- and you know something terrible is going to happen after the play. The tenderness and sweetness between siblings, the images of visions and memories, the narrative power of this horror play is what sets it a part from many other horror short plays. This would be a perfect addition to any Halloween Play Festival. I would love to read a zombie full-length by Partain!

Does what a one-minute play should do -- entertain and make you think without it coming across as a Saturday Night skit. Don't dismiss one-minute plays as slight; they take skill, just like haikus or painting on the head of a needle. There's Art in short short theatre, and it can be necessary theatre in 60 seconds. This is a perfect example. With tight structure, social commentary, topical issues of race relations and immigration, and a unexpected twist of a revelation at the end, Gonzalez's MISSION TRIP will be a hit at any one-minute play festival in the U.S.

Most monologues are just entertaining for me, a few laughs, they rarely make me reflect on myself and what has made me who I am. If you've been awarded a scholarship or not, if you're a beneficiary of something, you probably owe thanks to those before you -- parents, grandparents, friends, ancestors, whatever. White uses real-life situations to inspire poetic monologues -- and that's inspiring for me as a playwright. This is beautiful writing, never precious, not false, a slow heartfelt serious reflection on legacy, on how the past still makes an impression on the present and the future.

Beautiful like a prayer. It's a play I want to see staged -- and I think you'll agree after reading this. We live in dangerous times, so much cruelty and injustice to make us lonely, depressed and frightened. This play offers hope, reminds us to make a connection, to open up -- that will make us fly from our misery and pain. Check it out.

This powerful solo play is proof that LGBTQ fighters for justice and rights have so much more work to do -- the fight is not over. This solo puts the light on an often ignored part of the LGBTQ community in our media - homeless Queer youth. In a country under the Trump Administration, with LBGTQ rights being threatened monthly, this solo play is necessary for our American stages, and would make a powerful addition to an evening of monologues and short plays. It would be a great selection for a theatre working with a NPO.