Recommended by Barry Wallace

This is a great monologue, concise and to the point. It illustrates the speaker's mindset and follows through on his thought process and we see him come to a conclusion and act on it. Plus a nice comic beat at the end. Nicely done.

Jack Levine's play TWO COOKIES PLEASE is about 3 hapless people caught in a loop of blissful misunderstanding and frustration. You feel a bit of sympathy for the bad guy, who's just trying to do his job while dealing with an elderly couple barely able to hold a conversation before forgetting where they've been, how they got there and what's next. I'd love to see more stories with this couple, assuming they didn't freeze to death.

I love this genre, and I love stories that parody this genre even more. A nice, tight, comic confrontation with sparkly dialogue and fun characterization ("Fabric softeners cause communism") slew me. I'd love to see a series of interactions between this duo.

Beautifully So is an interesting little play that starts out examining a set of conventions and goes in another direction entirely and tests those conventions. Marriage and what happens over the years of a marriage have certain universal constants - trust, expectations and collaboration. Couples have to work together constantly keep a marriage fresh, and Brian's play beautifully shows that there are always different ways to do so.

I really enjoyed reading Dale Griffith Stamos' "One White Crow," especially since some of the themes mirrored one of my own plays. It was interesting seeing the ideas explored in a different way. Very enjoyable to read and with some intriguing staging opportunities, I would love to see this performed live. I especially appreciated following the main character's arc throughout the play, it's how main characters should be written. Well done!

What a great little play about parenting, and how we never quite grow up ourselves. A character performer at a kid's birthday party gets the full fanboy/girl treatment from mom and dad, who may just be more into kids' shows than their kid. Many of us can relate, and we cherish the memories teaching our kids what it's like to be a fan. Very funny, very relatable short comedy.

Life is a cycle. Out with the old, in with the new. Rinse, repeat. Break the tongue depressor, if you're a M*A*S*H fan. This Vietnam fable highlights a bright, young man's descent into madness during his isolation in the midst of war. Disillusionment, betrayal, and an ongoing conflict with the broken person he will become highlight this engaging look into war and its repetitive waste. Why? Because life is a cycle. Out with the old, in with the....

I think this is my favorite kind of monologue - unanchored to a larger work, not tethered with expectations that an audience know their backstory from earlier in the play. Just a quick, meaningful character study of someone we suddenly meet, get to know, then join then as they go through some kind of change. Or in the case of Michele's graceful work, share the character's recollective joy of self-discovery. Would love to see this on stage!

I love plays like this: taking a look at the afterlife, in a humorous and thoughtful way. It's not heavy or portentous, just a fact of "life" (or non-"non-aliveness"). The returning bar characters deal with their reality the best way they know how, while offering sympathy and support to the newcomers. Well done!

A concise workplace drama about learning who your true friends - and maybe more than friends - are. Very well done, and I recognize all these people! Hopefully someone who sees or reads this will think twice about how to truly appreciate the spirit of holiday gift-giving.