Recommended by Vince Gatton

They say the devil's in the details -- but angels can be, too. Such is the case with this lovely ghost story monologue from Mr. Keyes, wherein the specificity of particular sights, sounds, smells, and objects draws you completely into a vividly real, albeit mundane, moment...making it all the more powerful when something profoundly *not* mundane occurs. Evocative and relatable, it allows you to know exactly how this room feels, how it smells, how it sounds...and how it would feel to experience what happened there. A quietly thrilling short piece.

The banter is relaxed and jovial, believable and fun...until the swerve comes and none of it is fun any more. What I admire most about this terrific short, though, is that the big swerve isn't all it's interested in: other, subtler turns keep coming, leading us to places we didn't expect at the outset, or even in the middle. As is often the case in his plays, DC Cathro lets you think you're in one kind of play, hard-turns into another, then drops you off on the shores of something more fully rounded, interesting, complicated, and humane.

I love a good spooky story, and I really love a good spooky story about people telling spooky stories. This one has all that, plus hidden drama lurking under the surface that you can't possibly see coming until it hits you in the face and makes you gasp. With terrific dialogue and genuine affection sparking back and forth between its delightful best-friend characters, this short play manages to be everything you want in a scary story told around a fire: it's fun, chilling, and sad as hell, all at once.

I love these characters so much. At once an intimate story of two adult brothers in a motel room and an epic candy-colored fantasy bonanza, this highly imaginative, deeply personal, extremely playful, and profoundly moving play swings big, exploring how children's imagination and play are more than just games. Family history and the set itself keep yielding up surprises, creating an aural and visual vocabulary that combines gritty naturalism with explosive make-believe. Christian St. Croix's characters may recoil from sentimentality, but they're poignant as hell nonetheless in their open hurts, longings, and abundant love. A knockout.

It’s rare to see a stage play swim in the serial-killer-hunting waters so common in TV and film, and Jarred Corona dives in beautifully here. Someone is throwing teen boys off of rooftops, and flawed detective Ellis sets out to stop them. Amid the spot-on execution of tropes you’d find in SEVEN or L&O: SVU, we get a story steeped in Southern culture, loaded up with distinctive characters, sprinkled with casually queer romance, and told in dialogue that alternates between hard-boiled pragmatism and ethereal, haunted beauty. A dark film noir reboot for the way we live now.

This gorgeous piece of writing does a great job of exploring the isolation and yearning of the time we're living in without being *about* the time we're living in. Alone on the International Space Station after an unknown catastrophe has wiped out life on Earth, Commander Jessica hears another human's voice for the first time in years. What ensues is relatable, witty, smart, and incredibly moving, without ever descending into maudlin sentimentality. These characters are vivid, rich, and real, and their difficult choices make for great drama and well-earned emotional impact. Deeply satisfying, start to finish.

This sly play is demented, relentless, and nightmarish -- by which I mean I love it. A couple in a vaguely-tired marriage finds itself trapped in a No-Exit-with-bread-sticks situation; and while the comic potential of the premise (and <chef's kiss>-worthy title) goes fully and satisfyingly explored, so too does the horror. Prillaman has the courage of his convictions, sticking to his guns as he pushes his scenario further and further, testing its limits until we are fully stuffed with the terror, hilarity, and despair of it all...and yet he finds something very moving in it as well. Brilliant.

We’re all just one click away from disaster, or such at least is my takeaway from this short, sharp, shock of a play. What was meant to be a small, funny family moment rapidly snowballs downhill into an avalanche of recriminations and consequences. Abetted by technology and unfolding with the logic of a too-real nightmare, the rapid escalation of family resentments, tensions, and slights will knock the wind out of you. Excellent and queasy-making.

Is “unbearable” a word one can use to praise a play? It’s the word I keep coming back to regarding The Known Universe, the gorgeous and excruciating conclusion to Sickles’ Second World Trilogy. It begins with these beloved characters receiving truly unbearable news, then proceeds to show how they bear it. Sickles being Sickles, though, it’s anything but a slog: funny, sexy, overflowing with love, and with a central dramatic question that stays alive right to its final moment, The Known Universe is packed with both unbearable sorrow and hard-earned wisdom. And tears. Many tears. Bring tissues.

This is the second short play I've read this week inspired by Orpheus and Eurydice (the other being John Bavoso's "Gaydestown"), and I'm struck by how beautifully these writers take this ancient story to such varied and interesting places. Tyler Joseph Rossi has set his on the icy face of Mt. Everest, giving us a haunting exploration of grief and regret that is poetic, spare, musical, and absolutely heartbreaking. Gorgeous, gorgeous work.