"Themes elicited by I-Ching hexagrams" are the starting point for this anthology of eight short pieces by local playwrights. Director Marcus Lee explains in the playbill that the writers used passages from the I-Ching as themes and applied "one of eight arbitrary limitations" to each of them. He lists the limitations in the playbill but leaves it up to the audience to match the eight pieces with the eight limitations. Good luck!

The most successful as pure entertainment is "Harumagedon," a parody of Japanese theater as performed by robots, written by R. Kevin and Sharon R. Garcia Doyle. The Master (Sharon R. Garcia Doyle) informs his servants, Taro Kaja (Trevor H. Craighead) and Jiro Kaja (Ailia Hopkins), that they are to make camp while he looks for firewood. Taro Kaja is to dig a hole for the fire. Jiro Kaja is to "keep an eye on him."

Taro Kaja starts digging, with the digging effects provided by an "invisible" kokken stagehand (Taran Bowlby), but something goes wrong.

"I have broken Japan," he exclaims as the hole suddenly begins growing of its own accord. The kokken carries Taro Kaja to safety, but the Master falls in the bottomless hole and is swept away — sparing Taro Kaja any punishment for causing the destruction.

Bowlby and Craighead are the players in "4:00," playwright Maureen McGranaghan’s dramatic vignette about two gay priests. Philip (Craighead) was caught and expelled from the church; Father David (Bowlby) kept silent and was not found out.

The creative process of writing fiction and overcoming writer’s block is the subject of a third engaging piece that utilizes the talents of Bowlby, Craighead, Doyle, Hopkins and Maseeh Ganjali. Unfortunately, playwright Kemuel DeMoville gave the work a title that can’t be printed in this newspaper.

Most of the other pieces are opaque and their meanings and relevance to the central theme unclear. Explaining how all eight connect to the "eight arbitrary limitations" would make this a more rewarding experience.