Recommended by Steven G. Martin

This one-minute play is a nice, focused satire. I wish I had written it.

Eric Duhon shows that War is a game, and war is a game -- both can be won without skill, and both can be inevitable based on what has come before. It's comic and brisk and fun, before Duhon changes the perspective with the end line.

Deceptively simple, "War" says quite a bit. This would make an excellent entry in a one-minute play festival.

There's never enough time, neither in the past nor the present. This one-minute dramatic play is about time, timing, and loss associated them.

Perhaps the most life-affirming, in-the-moment, cause-of-celebration moment for this play is the one minute Eric Duhon spent writing it. It feels very much like "No Time: The One-Minute Play That Was Written in One Minute" serves notice that we need to make time, make connections, and Duhon's imagination and insight took over.

For as straightforward and slight as the dialogue is, this play is deceptively deep.

This one-minute comedy starts as a cringeworthy moment that builds and builds until it reaches a tipping point and changes into a stinging critique of American insularity and the fetishizing of cultural differences.

And it's funny, too! Credit Eric Duhon for knowing just when to make the switch from cringe to grins in "The Canadian Lady." Too much later, and the payoff wouldn't have worked. Too early, and the point isn't quite made.

This comedy is perfect for a one-minute play festival.

This 10-minute comedy has a nice nod to Dickens and shows how the holidays can magnify the symptoms of grief. I love that there's a bit of sentimentality here, balanced by family-based humor.

Rachel Bublitz has written a wonderful short holiday play in "Mom's Ham." It will appeal to audiences enjoying a festival of holiday plays. This is an affirming and generous play, which would be a pleasant diversion from all the sarcastic plays set around that time of year.

This short play is a cheery, gently funny comedy. How do you respond when you finally achieve something you've worked your whole life for, only to realize others have achieved it too -- with probably a lot more nonchalance and a lot less reverence?

Evan Spreen addresses a lofty subject in "Taro in the 4th Dimension" -- transcendence -- and then showcases its protagonist's comic frustrations and disillusionment really well.

Great character play, great play for directors and actors. It's bound to bring a smile to an audience member's face.

A perfect example of dark comedy with an extreme personality ("But I’m a really persistent person") with a desperate need and the resources to get what she wants.

The audience's unease in watching Sam Collier's "The Last Tooth" builds slowly at the front but will rocket to shock and visceral disgust before Collier's protagonist gets what she wants.

Funny, disturbing, dark, funny, unforgettable, dark, and funny.

Sexy, sultry, adult, and funny. This 10-minute play for Zoom/online performance has great characters at odds with one another at the start, a fun set up and premise, and a terrific ending. The climax is spectacular, too.

I love that Debbie Lamedman's "Mind Control" adds to the trend of LGBTQIA+ plays that speak to all aspects of life, including sex.

This full-length play showcases exceptional, precise character studies that examine the intersection of maleness with age, gender and sexual identity, and culture. It also wisely knows that the five characters portrayed are just a handful of the variety of men in the world.

Alan Safier allows his characters to pass judgements on one another and what it means to be a man in "Love, Loss, & What I Drove." But even if they tease, taunt, or question one another, Safier allows all of them to shine and to show their true selves.

A drama replete with fully dimensional characters, life-changing circumstances and events, longing and questioning, and an uncertainty of what life might hold as it changes.

Dave Osmundsen doesn't expect his characters to be heroic, nor does he treat them as villains. In "The Gift of BS," Osmundsen has a clear eyed view of his characters' flaws and strengths. He sees how mentor/mentee relationships can change, how sudden loss and long-lasting ruts can equally throw a person off their confidence. And that, like it or not, there's more life to live regardless of how selfless or self-centered we are.

This unsettling drama plays solidly in the haunted house realm of stories. What especially struck me was all the waiting Rich must endure, and the tension it created.

Daniel Prillaman creates a gift for sound designers and actors in "Water Damage," which would creepily fit into any theatrical festival build around the horror genre.