Recommended by Kim E. Ruyle

Family dysfunction, female-centered, and mature actors. It’s a winning combination. As in so many families, there’s dysfunction, even outright hostility, on the surface. But there is a mother-daughter and sibling love underneath, and these women dig their way through to find it in the end. Levity lightens the painful digging and gives a nice balance to the story. Well done.

A wife pissed off at a timid and inept hitman who needs money for medical school tuition. It’s a funny premise set in a laundromat which contributes to the comedy. Dan is a flawed but thoroughly likeable character who, understandably, has a crisis of conscience. Gail has some great lines as the frustrated, verbally-challenged antagonist. Throw out some stuff, fold your socks in thirds, and enjoy Fing Shooie!

You’ll rarely find such distinctly drawn characters as Faith, Ellen, and Gail in It Takes Three. Millar Introduces us to these three mismatched coworkers in their office setting where the conversation is quite funny for what’s communicated and, even more so, for what’s miscommunicated. From the office, we enter Gail’s home, and everything ramps up to a surprise ending. Lots of fun for actors and laughs for the audience.

It’s great to see fun roles for senior actors, and Expiration fits the bill. But no one seems to fit Bill, the lone male in the story who endures a series of hilarious, disastrous speed dates. Can there be no one who is a good match for a 75-year-old guy with a pension who can drive at night? Expiration is terrific.

Even in one little family there can be many secrets, tragedies, and broken relationships. In Lynn Millar’s play the relationship between Gwen and Nora, grandmother and granddaughter, is solid enough to allow Nora to share a secret and unburden her heart. Just in Our Little Family is thought-provoking and will undoubtedly provoke discussion after the curtain. Well done.

Lee Lawing lures us into what could be just another pedestrian park bench play, but the mystery about the relationship between the two seniors on the bench builds until… Bam! A shocking reveal and conclusion as the mystery is solved. Excellent!

It’s a great set up: a bride with pre-wedding jitters is noshing – on nachos of all things! – when she has a dental emergency. And from that premise, Jean Ciampi uses a super glue-wielding funeral director and a surprise ending to deliver a great 10-minute comedy. Terrific.

Dante’s Inferno has nothing on Ben and Annie’s vacation. Instead of a wonderful cultural adventure in Italy, it's a vacation from hell. Everything goes wrong in their sumptuous vacation apartment, including the air conditioning during a record-breaking heatwave. When Annie’s brother and girlfriend arrive, bickering escalates and is punctuated with non-stop physical comedy. Characters are engaging and well-drawn. In the end, they all leave with more than bad memories. It's lots of fun. Well done.

Tom Erb mines a wedding scenario and unearths one comedic jewel after another - angry bees, spiked brownies, a skunk, comical debauchery, and injuries galore. What a fun piece to stage!

What price do actors pay to deliver cinematic gold, a scene that raises a film from comedy to tragedy, from trite to poignant, from ape story to love story? For Brit, it’s a price too high. Too high, that is, until the thought of a mere secretary taking her place is so offensive that it trumps Brit’s feminist sensibilities. It’s a great premise.