Wolfie by Ross WIllis
Cast: 2F (twins, playing multiple characters)
Synopsis: A spiralling odyssey of dizzying theatricality, Wolfie is a bold, fantastical fairytale following two twins separated at birth, and asks who is truly responsible for society's most vulnerable children. Ross Willis's debut play is a wildly imaginative, irreverent look at life in – and after – the care system.
Why it's great: Wolfie was awarded Best Play at the 2020 Writers' Guild Awards, and Best New Play at the 2020 Off-West End Awards. Laugh-out-loud funny yet never hesitating to be brutally honest when necessary, this is a strange and striking debut play, with a fearless voice behind it.
Teenage Dick by Mike Lew
Cast: 4F, 2M
Synopsis: A darkly comic, smashed-up retelling of Richard III, Shakespeare's classic tale about the lust for power, Teenage Dick reimagines the most famous disabled character of all time as a high-school outsider in junior year: the deepest winter of his discontent.
Why it's great: This text retells Shakespeare with a much-needed urgency, providing an arch reminder that the voices of the disabled have often been ignored, terrorised or shouted down from the earliest possibility. A smart, probing play that is a sharp modern-day reinvention of a Shakespearian classic.
Wonder Boy by Ross Willis
Cast: 1M, 4F, 1 either
Synopsis: Sonny is twelve. He's the new kid in school, he's lonely and he stammers. He's finding his way in a world ruled by vicious vowels, confusing consonants, and let's not forget the biggest beast of them all - small talk. To make matters worse, the headteacher has decided that he's going to be in the school production of Hamlet. Sonny's only friend is Captain Chatter, a comic book hero of his own creation, but in the real-world, language is power and Sonny must find a way to be heard.
Why it's great: The story and themes will connect with the PHSE curriculum including anti-bullying, oracy, emotional intelligence, healthy relationships and resilience, as well as GCSE and A Level Drama syllabuses; the play features live, integrated creative captioning. To add to this, in production, all of the characters' lines are projected onto part of the set, including lines delivered in British Sign Language. Ultimately, the show embraces different methods of communication in its story and presentation and has a free resource for educators.
Tuesday by Alison Carr
Cast: Any number, any gender (minimum of 5F, 4M)
Synopsis: An ordinary Tuesday turns really, really weird when the sky over the school playground suddenly rips open. Pupils and teachers are sucked up to a parallel universe, while a new set of people start raining down from above. ‘Us’ and ‘Them’ must come together to work out what is going on, and how they can get things back to how they were.
Why it's great: Funny and playful, with a little bit of sci-fi, this text covers a lot of big themes: friendship, family, identity, grief and responsibility. Written specifically for young people, the play formed part of the 2020, 2021 and 2023 National Theatre Connections Festivals and was premiered by youth theatres across the UK. It offers opportunities for a large, flexible cast of any size, age and mix of genders. Tuesday is a set play on WJEC's GCSE Drama specification.
Germ Free Adolescent by Natalie Mitchell
Cast: 1F, 1M
Synopsis: 16-year-old Ashley has OCD. She's lived in Medway for 15 years and six months. She has 2,354 leaflets on sexual health. She knows exactly how many she has, because she's counted them 1,582 times. At 7.48 p.m. tonight, she will have been going out with Ollie for exactly three months, which he thinks means it's time to take their relationship to the next level; especially given her position as their school's resident expert on sexual health. But what if counting leaflets can't protect Ashley from getting hurt when she decides to take her biggest risk yet?
Why it's great: It is a fierce, funny and irreverent OCD love story that asks: what exactly is ‘normal’ anyway? It received its first full production at The Bunker, London, in October 2019, having previously toured Kent where the play was researched and developed with young people, youth workers and mental-health services.