Recommended by Franky D. Gonzalez

There are comedies and there are dramas, then there are problem plays which combine elements of both. Then you have plays in the mode of TWO LATE by Allan Maule. A play with such compelling, neurotic, and emotionally dynamic characters who will make you laugh and make you cry instantly . It's a play that takes the mundane stakes of a TSA agent and a very disgruntled airline passenger and ratchets it up with some of the biggest questions of the human condition. And like a master at work, Maule gives us a perfect ending. Read this play now!!!

Joshua Brewer's DIRT has a unique talent of squeezing lifetimes of emotions out of two characters and just a few pages more. He leads us one way and we're down another path altogether in this jaw-dropper of a play. It's tender, twisted, and tragic. To pack this much into such a short play is a sign of talent. You will find yourself going back to the beginning to see if you missed something because of how left-field this play comes at you. But when you read it again, you understand; it was there all along. Just look in the dirt.

There are times you meet people in a single moment of their life with no backstory. And yet, you are moved as much as if you'd known them forever. Kevin King gives us an overview of and critique of the concerns and situations many in rural America. From opioids, stolen goods, to drinking, to accepting of f LGBTQ family, down to Southern politeness, guilt for unintended lies, and ultimately the caring shown between those with shared experiences. This play is like a little flower that blossoms with time and it is all the more beautiful for the time invested.

A beautiful coming-of-age story that marries the cynicism of adulthood and childhood idealism. You are taken with the silliness and self-importance lifted almost directly from Scooby Doo and the Hardy Boys from Ben, and you absolutely love the lampooning of these tropes by the more world-weary Gabriel. Using these two characters John Adams creates a new mystery within a mystery that these two young men reckoning with their pain were recruited to solve. Like the best of storytellers Adams doesn't allow us easy endings. Rather, he leaves us with much more in the unsolved mysteries of grief and early departures.

There are plays whose scenario serves to remind us of a sobering reality. In THE BRIEFING by Simon Bowler we see logic and hard numbers turned into political expediency and financial opportunism. The play reads like an exercise in a madness so patently stupid that it couldn't possibly be true, knowing damn well it's the closest thing to truth we have. It may well be a matter of perspective, but it's still absurd. Bowler spares no blow and gives us what can only be called truth in the absence of that from those in power. A unsettling yet beautiful play.

This is the existential crisis for the baseball fan. An absolutely WONDERFUL comedy between men you can swear you've heard before at a bar, or in your living room growing up. This is the kind of play that leaves you reading it again and again for its realistic dialogue and perfect blend of comedy, superstition, and honest-to-God decision making of the highest stakes for a Red Sox fan. Don't mistake this as a Boston only play, though. This is one for any place you'll find a baseball fan. A great addition to any festival wanting a good laugh.

A hilarious yet ultimately tender piece wherein a couple are visited again and again by time travelers with a dire message about the decisions made by the couple and the consequences that follow. You'll find yourself laughing at the lines and wondering what new message each time traveler will bring with each decision made. Greg Lam is able to take weighty questions that would usually require a lot of emotional commitment from the actors and gives us a smile to go with those questions. It's a lovely play that deserves many productions and new audiences to delight in the words.

While the description says post-apocalyptic, this one-minute gem holds a tone that is strikingly present and immediate. First impressions hold so much risk on all levels that we are all in a way an Examiner pre-judging and assuming things that are not true of the individual. This play pleas with us and asks us to take a needed step back in these times where assumptions become the stiffness that breaks down the road to compromise, amity, and coming together. A wonderful short play with a beautiful message.

A play that explores the process of changing your ways and trying to find a way forward in a new society that has left you and your mistaken beliefs behind. It is a play that challenges as well as questions what we are and where we are going, and even what we've become. There are no easy answers, but possibilities are abound in Jessie Salsbury's unique look into the future.

A hypnotic and evocative drama that deals with some of the heaviest themes. It's timeless quality is what makes it timely, and after reading this play you are saddened that this is a timeless play. Nevertheless, it is a play whose structure and beauty will leave you repeating lines and feeling a shiver at such sadness and horror. It lampoons one of our great sacred cows in America and makes you feel intense emotion for the sins of the past.