Recommended by Lucretia Anne Flammang

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    I organized a reading of excerpts of “The Book of a Universe Inside of a Universe,” and even in a shortened form, the play impressed me with its ambition and scope. Covering three generations, two wars, and half the globe, in its lyricism and inventive staging, the play calls to mind Wilder’s "Skin of Our Teeth" and Kushner’s "Angels in America." The sly humor of a tomato sandwich does not diminish "Universe's" emotional wallop, a story about love and one man’s search for his lost father.

    I organized a reading of excerpts of “The Book of a Universe Inside of a Universe,” and even in a shortened form, the play impressed me with its ambition and scope. Covering three generations, two wars, and half the globe, in its lyricism and inventive staging, the play calls to mind Wilder’s "Skin of Our Teeth" and Kushner’s "Angels in America." The sly humor of a tomato sandwich does not diminish "Universe's" emotional wallop, a story about love and one man’s search for his lost father.

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    How does loyalty fare when monarchs exercise their power? David Beardsley explores the question in “Holy and Unruly,” his thought-provoking speculation about what transpired when the Irish pirate Grace O’Malley met England’s Queen Elizabeth I. Eschewing straightforward history, Beardsley employs wonderful stagecraft, especially in characters who embody Elizabeth’s regrets. Like a Greek chorus only the Queen and audience see, these characters comment on the action in mime and dance. At times humorous and unexpectedly violent, the play resolves in a confrontation where the Queen and Pirate...

    How does loyalty fare when monarchs exercise their power? David Beardsley explores the question in “Holy and Unruly,” his thought-provoking speculation about what transpired when the Irish pirate Grace O’Malley met England’s Queen Elizabeth I. Eschewing straightforward history, Beardsley employs wonderful stagecraft, especially in characters who embody Elizabeth’s regrets. Like a Greek chorus only the Queen and audience see, these characters comment on the action in mime and dance. At times humorous and unexpectedly violent, the play resolves in a confrontation where the Queen and Pirate choose loyalty to each other and rewrite the script on power.

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  • In “Girl with a Gun,” Suzanne Willett places Army women in an impossible moral situation and drives the action to its inevitable, troubling conclusion. Set in Iraq, the play follows a Female Engagement Team as they prepare for and execute a mission “outside the wire.” Under pressure from a previous mission when both their commander and an Iraqi boy were killed, the FET struggles with the ramifications of encountering and using lethal force. In this important play, Willett lays claim to a genre long about men and contributes a compelling drama about women with guns.

    In “Girl with a Gun,” Suzanne Willett places Army women in an impossible moral situation and drives the action to its inevitable, troubling conclusion. Set in Iraq, the play follows a Female Engagement Team as they prepare for and execute a mission “outside the wire.” Under pressure from a previous mission when both their commander and an Iraqi boy were killed, the FET struggles with the ramifications of encountering and using lethal force. In this important play, Willett lays claim to a genre long about men and contributes a compelling drama about women with guns.

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    In “Concordance,” John Minigan displays his love of language, story, and theater as an empty space humming with possibilities. Five actors portray 22 characters to convey 38 years in the life of Alexander Cruden, compiler of a Biblical concordance. Minigan structures the play in a series of visions that flow like fragments of a mad man’s memory. Cruden was not merely insane, though; he was the victim of injustices practiced against the poor. By turns wildly funny and heartbreaking, “Concordance” is a masterful play about one man’s faith in love, God, and the power of promises.

    In “Concordance,” John Minigan displays his love of language, story, and theater as an empty space humming with possibilities. Five actors portray 22 characters to convey 38 years in the life of Alexander Cruden, compiler of a Biblical concordance. Minigan structures the play in a series of visions that flow like fragments of a mad man’s memory. Cruden was not merely insane, though; he was the victim of injustices practiced against the poor. By turns wildly funny and heartbreaking, “Concordance” is a masterful play about one man’s faith in love, God, and the power of promises.

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    Send in the bears! In this surprising play, bears of all kinds help an artist determine what sacrifices she should make to save her foundering marriage. Neither wholly surrealistic nor realistic, “The Great Teddy Bear Shipwreck Mystery” unfolds in the literary space of the “fantastic,” where the audience cannot discern the real from the unreal. In this unstable place, shipwrecks occur, love is lost, and an artist is born. Ever-daring, Emily Zemba explores the mysteries of marriage and family through one fantastic journey, over seas and into woods, but never truly leaves home.

    Send in the bears! In this surprising play, bears of all kinds help an artist determine what sacrifices she should make to save her foundering marriage. Neither wholly surrealistic nor realistic, “The Great Teddy Bear Shipwreck Mystery” unfolds in the literary space of the “fantastic,” where the audience cannot discern the real from the unreal. In this unstable place, shipwrecks occur, love is lost, and an artist is born. Ever-daring, Emily Zemba explores the mysteries of marriage and family through one fantastic journey, over seas and into woods, but never truly leaves home.

  • Lucretia Anne Flammang: Hitch by James McLindon
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    What happens when a forlorn father picks up a teenaged hitchhiker with no plan but to run away? This is the simple question at the heart of James McLindon’s excellent two-hander “Hitch.” McLindon employs the dramatic conventions of a road trip and claustrophobic setting to examine how we learn to trust people whose differences in race and age often prevent connection. With great humanity and humor, McLindon takes the audience on a journey with unexpected turns and leaves us, finally, at a point in the road where we may dare to hope, for the characters’ future, and our own.

    What happens when a forlorn father picks up a teenaged hitchhiker with no plan but to run away? This is the simple question at the heart of James McLindon’s excellent two-hander “Hitch.” McLindon employs the dramatic conventions of a road trip and claustrophobic setting to examine how we learn to trust people whose differences in race and age often prevent connection. With great humanity and humor, McLindon takes the audience on a journey with unexpected turns and leaves us, finally, at a point in the road where we may dare to hope, for the characters’ future, and our own.

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  • Lucretia Anne Flammang: CAROL OF CARROLL GARDENS by B. Stewart
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    “Carol of Carroll Gardens” hides a few tricks up its sleeve. Ostensibly a story about a misanthropic woman with terminal cancer, the play layers great theatricality, surrealism, and transformations—of people, animals, and neighborhoods—in a savory dish. With poignancy and great humor, the play follows Carol through cancer treatment, assisted by her friend Scotty, kindly nurses, an ailing physician, and three magical cats. Structured beautifully and never predictable, “Carol” takes us on a journey that initially seems to be about preparing to die but ultimately is about learning to live...

    “Carol of Carroll Gardens” hides a few tricks up its sleeve. Ostensibly a story about a misanthropic woman with terminal cancer, the play layers great theatricality, surrealism, and transformations—of people, animals, and neighborhoods—in a savory dish. With poignancy and great humor, the play follows Carol through cancer treatment, assisted by her friend Scotty, kindly nurses, an ailing physician, and three magical cats. Structured beautifully and never predictable, “Carol” takes us on a journey that initially seems to be about preparing to die but ultimately is about learning to live. Readers at the Depot highly recommend it.

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  • Lucretia Anne Flammang: The Place That Made You by Darcy Parker Bruce
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    Darcy Parker Bruce’s highly theatrical “The Place That Made You” argues love can conquer death. Scenes flow between past and present, and concern Jonah, a young Trans man, who seeks purpose in his small hometown and finds it in the belly of a whale. Leaving home is hard, but returning sometimes requires a miracle. Bruce exhibits a powerful lyrical imagination in layered dialog, supernatural journeys, and poetic stage directions. The play stirred readers at the Depot with its daring juxtapositions of the intimate and the mythic. This drama took us someplace new and moved us with its beauty.

    Darcy Parker Bruce’s highly theatrical “The Place That Made You” argues love can conquer death. Scenes flow between past and present, and concern Jonah, a young Trans man, who seeks purpose in his small hometown and finds it in the belly of a whale. Leaving home is hard, but returning sometimes requires a miracle. Bruce exhibits a powerful lyrical imagination in layered dialog, supernatural journeys, and poetic stage directions. The play stirred readers at the Depot with its daring juxtapositions of the intimate and the mythic. This drama took us someplace new and moved us with its beauty.

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  • Lucretia Anne Flammang: IN COMMON by Quinn D. Eli
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    "IN COMMON" is very smart and witty; the language snaps, and the story flies. The play examines how
    power--conferred asymmetrically through gender, race, ethnicity, and sexuality--evokes envy and destroys trust among friends who have known one another for years. The conflicts among the highly sympathetic characters are urgent, and contemporary issues of identity are treated dramatically, without recourse to polemic or didacticism. At the Depot for New Play Readings, "IN COMMON" elicited strong feelings and debate. This is a play that will get audiences talking on their way home.

    "IN COMMON" is very smart and witty; the language snaps, and the story flies. The play examines how
    power--conferred asymmetrically through gender, race, ethnicity, and sexuality--evokes envy and destroys trust among friends who have known one another for years. The conflicts among the highly sympathetic characters are urgent, and contemporary issues of identity are treated dramatically, without recourse to polemic or didacticism. At the Depot for New Play Readings, "IN COMMON" elicited strong feelings and debate. This is a play that will get audiences talking on their way home.

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  • Lucretia Anne Flammang: The Rhode Island Chapter by Jeanne Beckwith
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    The readers at the Depot for New Play Readings and Chelsea Players laughed their way through "The Rhode Island Chapter." Jeanne Beckwith begins with the true story of the Brown family, nineteenth-century Rhode Islanders who believed one of their daughters had become a vampire, so they exhumed her body and conducted a ritual vampire slaying to save themselves. In the play, Beckwith offers a clever twist to the vampire myth, and in the process, writes a valentine to New England and its regional folklore. This is one-act play easily could be paired with another "scary" play, perfect for Halloween...

    The readers at the Depot for New Play Readings and Chelsea Players laughed their way through "The Rhode Island Chapter." Jeanne Beckwith begins with the true story of the Brown family, nineteenth-century Rhode Islanders who believed one of their daughters had become a vampire, so they exhumed her body and conducted a ritual vampire slaying to save themselves. In the play, Beckwith offers a clever twist to the vampire myth, and in the process, writes a valentine to New England and its regional folklore. This is one-act play easily could be paired with another "scary" play, perfect for Halloween.

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