Recommended by Lisa Dellagiarino Feriend

This short is funny and sweet in equal measure! Sometimes in life, it really is all about timing. What didn't work during one season in your life might go differently later, as we are all constantly growing and evolving. I love this humor, the mismatched energy of the two characters, and the open-ended resolution.

Oh my goodness. This tiny play about lives that converge in a sex shop is actually about huge, huge things, like loneliness, settling, and how much we need other people. It is gorgeous in its specificity and the dialogue, as with all Gina Femia plays, sparkles.

I read this one for the title, and it was as bonkers as I had hoped it would be, but then it also became more powerful and heartbreaking than I expected. What a wholly original piece of theater.

This short psychological horror play is EFFECTIVE - probably because it centers on bullying, and haven’t we all had revenge fantasies about our bullies? This play feeds the darkest impulses of human nature, highlighting how easy it is to convince yourself you’re a hero when you’re acting like a villain.

This one-act is an amazing vehicle for six teenage girls to show off their acting! Spending their teenage years in a TB sanatorium, it's lovely to see the small ways in which they manage to be normal teenage girls, despite their abnormal teenage circumstances. They get so excited over such tiny things - holding hands sneakily when the nurses aren't looking, watching the sanatorium's boys through field glasses, etc - that the play ends up being a great reminder not to take things for granted.

What an ambitious play this is! Somehow, despite its enormous cast and enormous page count, it still feels tight and cohesive, with through lines stringing the play together. It almost reminds me of a symphony, where many different instruments are playing many different parts, but instead of creating chaos, it all works together to create something beautiful.

Ooh I love how this one act feels like being told a series of stories for the price of one, all loosely centered around the mini-Stonehenge TJ and Kendra are building in the backyard, since they can't go see the real thing. These stories differ in tone but still feel cohesive in a really impressive way, and they all center people who are struggling in one way or another. Really versatile, fantastic stuff!

What a fun play for middle schoolers! I adore this Literary Detective Club and their cosplay. Despite having a cast on the bigger side (perfect for a drama class!), everyone manages to get some fun moments and carve out their own distinct personalities, which is super impressive. Also, I learned who C. Auguste Dupin is (and felt appropriately ashamed by my ignorance.) Drama kids' parents sit through a lot of bad plays. This isn't one of them. Please produce this in every middle school.

I thought I knew what this play was going to be, but I did NOT. How delightful to be surprised! A young husband comes home from WWII to find that his wife has outgrown their old life, while all he wants to do is start their old life up again. Add in a young widowed upstairs neighbor, and there's all kinds of tensions which build steadily throughout the play. With a small cast and a unit set, this would be an easy play to stage.

"It's all interconnected, this world of hurt and healing." If plays had a thesis sentence, this would be the one for "Landscape of Memory." Naoma is a gifted healer, but her father refuses to teach her what he knows, so she is forced to sneak peaks at his books when he's asleep and try to observe him on the sly. She grapples between who her father wants her to be, and who she wants to be. This play is set in Appalachia, but the struggle between outer expectations and inner desires is universal.