Recommended by Vince Gatton

I double-dog-dare you to find anyone better at the dystopian-nightmare-comedy genre than Daniel Prillaman. This absurdist three-hander set at the bottom of a deep, dark pit will give you all the Godot/Dumbwaiter vibes your heart desires, with Prillaman's own unique blend of humor, riddles, movie debates, and scatological references added in for flavor. Nothing this bleak should be this funny, nor this strangely charming...but that's what makes Prillaman Prillaman. Look on his works, ye mighty, and despair.

..Or don't. Despair, that is. You can always look for rocks.

If you’re skeptical of the one-minute play form, you will find no better argument for it than the works of Steve Martin. Once again he delivers here, in a short but powerful emotional saga with a beginning, middle, and end, packed with secrets, longings, implied backstory, reveals, decision points, and consequences. A story of huge emotional stakes told with breathtaking economy.

It's absurd, it's fantastical, it's unsettling, it's sad, and also very funny. You don't have to understand the world of this play to be entertained, amused, and moved by it. Who are these eccentrically-named and -costumed characters? How did they get here? And why? You won't find answers, but you will find high stakes, smartly-executed lazzi, and a tremendous lot of heart.

As a horror fan and once-upon-a-time gay teenager, this was right up my alley. de Forest gives us a “Scream”-esque, self-aware meta-slasher that plays with horror tropes even as it’s defining them - a conceit that could be handled lazily and for cheap laughs, but here is sharp, smart, and character-driven. What deepens this so satisfyingly beyond a sketch idea are the small beats that layer in genuine humor, warmth, romance, and humanity. And then there’s that perfect double-meaning of a title and deliciously ambiguous ending…

I want to throw up.

Not at Jillian Blevins' tense and moving script, but at the world we're living in that gave need for it. Three lively, distinct, and engaging kids grow up in a world where lockdown drills are a normal part of life; how that fact shapes and defines each of them over time shows up in Blevins' deft brush strokes and expertly calibrated escalations.

Kudos for finding a new way to illuminate this maddeningly familiar reality. May it some day be regarded as a period piece.

Did I smile? Did I giggle? Did I cheer? Did I get worried? Was I moved? Yes, yes, yes, yes, and YES. Yes to this endearing series of vignettes, a portrait of days in the life of two dogs: the chaos and the rituals, the habits and the adventures, the spark of something new and the comfort of what's always there. And as much as it's about dogs, it's of course also about us: how we play, and fear, and protect, and love. A charmer.

Oh, man. Sadie, I feel you. DC Cathro evokes the warm sense of comfort waiting to be found in the quiet, crisp cold. A lovely short piece about finding refuge when the world is too much with us.

I love a play that works on many levels, and Jillian Blevins has given me a banger with this one: The Eighteenth Quinquennial Endlings Picnic is at once an environmental parable, a political allegory, a mournful family drama, and a warmly hilarious character-driven comedy. The distinctiveness of these characters' personalities and points of view is rich and charming, and the innocent playfulness of the set up (It's animals! Having a picnic!) combines with the deadly weight of the issues at hand (Creeping disaster! Death! Revolution!) to terrific effect. I wanna see this live, please. Someone see to that.

Y’all. Sara Farrington’s brain is magical and a little scary. Her avant garde film/play hybrid MENDACITY is astonishing: she’s taken Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, puréed it, and strained it through January 6th and The Big Lie. The parallels she finds between Tennessee Williams’ family drama and the state of Democracy now - the resonances about lies, self-delusion, and power - repeatedly took my breath away. Plus the deranged, mad theatricality of it all! A gripping, weird, and wonderful dissection of where we are.

OK, this is delightful. Funny, meta, all those things, yes...but is it odd that I also found myself weirdly moved? If drama lies in characters making choices with high stakes, there's a courageous big swing someone takes at one point in these few short pages, and it's thrilling and kind of beautiful. And whether you find yourself feeling oddly "Awwwww...." about it like me or not, I'm pretty sure you'll find Special Extra Treatment a charmer.