Recommended by Mackenzie Raine Kirkman

Coffey does an excellent job setting up a world of impossible choices, ones so few of us many but so many of us fear having to. Children, love, and friendship all touch our lives in one way or another and here in Come When I Call the worst comes crashing together when people struggle between their idea of duty and their actual needs.

Messineo gives us a piece full of oranges and the inevitable horror of losing someone you love. The beauty of this piece is the dream-like way that it confronts how different losses and struggles intertwine. It's never just a death in the family. It's a death that digs at the trauma in a familial group, in religion, in femininity and history. Messineo makes sense of a topic we all know but struggle to speak about by giving us so many words that dance around the pain and make it known without saying it outright.

Swenson's series of plays is stunningly honest, just the way a child like Joey would be. There's no coyness in the words he says, or in the actions of the play. Just an honest presentation of his life and his understanding of it as a young boy. Both as a series and as a singular piece Swenson's work carries a weight I think only theatre truly can.

Corrigan's piece brings to mind Greek myth, somehow reminding us of the fields of Elysium and the banks of the River Styx all at once. There's a comfort in this piece, in the calm and unusual way that they characters speak and the serene environment. There's also a disquieting nature to it. The lack of change and the seemingly inescapable expanse of the field they stand in. What a beautiful challenge to try and stage.

Grotesque and beautiful, Pazniokas's piece is an amazing commentary on the self, the body, and the effects of power. This play lives in a stunningly clear world that invites just the right amount of imagination in its design without Pazniokas losing control over the overall story. It's really wonderful and I deeply hope to see it someday.

A fun little blimp about an obscure little history. Have I thought about how a thesaurus was born before? No. Will I now? Yes. Abrams play is a fun little piece that I think a comedic cast could really have a ball with.

More than any other modern playwright Langford knows how to use robots and messy time blimps to their absolute best by answering as few questions as she can about how they got in the play and focusing entirely on why they're in the play in the first place. It's a thing of beauty.

As a child, I was seriously, adamantly, repulsed by the idea that I had to read Little Women and like it because I was a "little woman" and I was expected to understand and resonate with it. Now I get it. Sure. I like it. But Femia's piece seems to understand why I am can like Little Women and why I so much didn't want to as a kid. "it's high concept!" as it says in the piece and it makes for a ton of fun asking to collaborate on every page with whatever lucky cast first gets a shot.

A neat and tidy adaptation of the famous story that utilizes the unique staging opportunities in theatre to frame the story. Martin's touches on the story are deft, giving us a taste of Poe through Martin's own sensibilities as a writer.

Bean has created a tidy little world for two distinct characters to introduce us to an incredibly messy and difficult topic. Their voices, like their love for each other, are incredibly clear in the script but the chasm that breaks between them is unfathomable and Bean's writing, wisely lets it stay that way asking the audience to sit with the difficult rather than brushing it aside or providing a false solution.