Along with many other villagers and area residents, local thespians Chuck Moran, left, and Ben Guenther will appear in several ten-minute plays in the upcoming annual festival produced by the YS Theater Company. The festival will be held at 888 Dayton St. on Friday and Saturday, June 6 and 7, beginning at 7 p.m. Shown here are Moran and Guenther rehearsing for “Storm Systems, Inc.” (Photo by Reilly Dixon)
10-Minute Play Festival returns this weekend at new location
- Published: June 3, 2025
The annual 10-Minute Play Festival, produced by the YS Theater Company, returns Friday and Saturday, June 6 and 7, beginning at 7 p.m. each evening.
As in years past, the festival will be held outdoors, but will be performed at a new location this summer: 888 Dayton St., just across East Enon Road from Antioch Midwest.
The entrance to the parking lot at the business suite is on East Enon Road. The YSTC’s new portable stage — which was purchased with a grant from the YS Community Foundation — will be set up on a grassy area at the edge of the parking lot.
Another new addition to the festival this year will be food trucks, with Wannabe Tacos present for Friday night and Salsa Brava on Saturday; Sugar Witch Magical Treats will be on hand both nights. YSTC will also have a concession stand. Those planning to attend are welcome to come out at 6:30 p.m. each night for a pre-show picnic.
In the event of inclement weather on either night, the performances will be moved into Westminster Hall in First Presbyterian Church, 314 Xenia Ave.
This year’s festival features eight plays from seven playwrights hailing from both the Miami Valley and elsewhere in the U.S. and Canada. As always, the plays are directed and performed by area thespians.
• “The Real Village Council,” by Scott Bachmann, of Yellow Springs; directed by Kristina Cordova. Cast: Chris Hutson, Lori Askeland, Carter Strolger, Eve Diamond, Ellen Ballerene and Rocket Cowperthwaite.
Playwright Bachmann is a local author who has participated in the 10-Minute Play Festival several times. His works include graphic novels, novels, illustrated books and plays. “The Real Village Council” takes a peek into the meeting of one of the village’s less vocal, but certainly visible, local bodies.
• “Soil Samples,” by Alex Bernstein, of Cranford, New Jersey; directed by Lauren Shows. Cast: Jeanna GunderKline, Chandra Jones-Graham, Anthony Fife, Lauren Shows.
Playwright Bernstein is the author of the “Miserable” series of books and “Pirknib,” and is the founder and co-producer of the “Curtains on Fire” writers’ workshop and podcast. He’s a staff writer on Peacock’s “The Dog & Pony Show,” and his work has appeared at McSweeney’s, The Rumpus, NewPopLit and many other venues. About “Soil Samples,” he writes: “This play takes everyday situations and spins them to a level of absurdity, hopefully to both comic and heartwarming effect.”
• “Facedown In Buttercups,” by Dave Carley, of Toronto, Canada; directed by Matthew Smith. Cast: Rachel Oprea and KL Storer.
Carley’s stage and radio plays have had over 500 productions in Canada, the United States and around the world. His works often deal with human rights concerns and include “Taking Liberties: The Last Liberal” and “Twelve Hours,” which premiered to acclaim in Columbus, Ohio. He has also adapted novels and stories by Margaret Atwood, Farley Mowat and Julio Cortazar.
About “Face Down In Buttercups,” Carley writes: “This play is based a bit on a real story featuring a neighbor who lay in wait at the corner postbox, hoping to retrieve a bit of mail she had rashly written. (She was not allowed to have it.)”
• “The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of,” written and directed by Tony Copper, of Xenia. Cast: Tony Copper, Chris Ashbrook, Christopher Wise, Jason Heaton and Tim Morand.
Playwright Copper has been involved in theater for 30 years as an actor, director and writer. He’s had 17 original plays produced, including “Crotchroaches,” which was featured in the 2024 10-Minute Play Festival, and 2016’s “The House of Horrors” at the Xenia Area Community Theater, or X*ACT. After working with X*ACT for nearly 10 years, he was inducted into its Hall of Fame in 2019.
The main character of “The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of,” Nathan Dark, has appeared in two full-length, audience-participation murder mysteries, as well as a crime fiction e-zine. Copper writes: “This particular comedy is about a heist gone wrong. In the words of Nathan Dark himself, [the play] is about ‘an overblown sense of entitlement and overpriced relics.’”
• “New Code,” by Andrea Fleck Cardy, of Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts; directed by Ali Thomas. Cast: Charlotte Walkey, Lauren Shows, Ben Guenther.
The playwright is a writer and activist whose short plays have been widely produced and anthologized and whose essays have appeared most recently in the Boston Globe.
Of “New Code,” Fleck Cardy writes: “I came of age when it was possible to believe that the arc of the moral universe was bending toward justice. That’s harder today. When I wrote an earlier version of ‘New Code’ some years ago, surveillance was only a vague fear. Now that it is a real and present danger, I’ve rewritten it with new urgency.”
• “Search for an Ending,” by Karissa Murrell Myers, of Chicago, Illinois; directed by Ellen Ballerene. Cast: Seth Ratliff, Dan Branstrator, Jada Merritt, Stefanie Wallace.
Murrell Myers is an award-winning Filipino-American theater artist who serves as artistic director and co-founder of the Bramble Theatre Company. Winner of the 2023 Maxim Mazumdar New Play Award and an O’Neill NPC finalist, her work has been developed and/or produced at Goodman Theatre, Alleyway Theatre, Paramount Theatre, Strawdog Theatre, Renaissance Theaterworks, The Road Theatre Company and Bramble, among others.
About “Search for an Ending,” Murrell Myers writes: “I came up with this play when I was reading on Reddit the experience so many female screenwriters were having in writing rooms and how dismissed they felt by their male counterparts.”
• “Storm Systems, Inc.,” written and directed by Reilly Dixon, of Yellow Springs; Cast: Chuck Moran, Ben Guenther.
“Storm Systems, Inc.” is a brief dialogue between two bureaucrats about an unusual part-time job — one with allegedly cosmic implications.
• “Please Think Responsibly,” written and directed by Reilly Dixon; Cast: Becca Bayman, Ellen Lee, Rakel Campbell, Steve McQueen, Matthew Salazar, Chuck Moran, Tom Sain, Danny Sauers, Andy Holquist.
“Please Think Responsibly” is an absurd vignette about a lost coterie of literature-starved college students seeking to wet their whistles. Hilarity ensues when they wind up in the wrong joint.
Suggested donation for the 10-Minute Play Festival is $15; visit the concession table to donate.
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