One moment you're watching an eerie exchange between dead Marxist Leon Trotsky, complete with a mountain climber's ax smashed into the back of his skull, and his wife.

Next you're interpreting secret meanings of common English words at a drunken toga party.

The third act has you following the biological life cycle of two smitten mayflies.

No Refund Theater (NRT) will present six diverse one-act plays carrying these humorous themes along with three others at 8 p.m. tomorrow and Saturday in 111 Forum.

Director Eric Montellese (junior-computer engineering) is the anchor of the six comic shorts written by David Ives.

He said he is grateful to take advantage of the opportunity that NRT offers non-theatre majors to dive into the art on the college level.

"I did a lot of theatre in high school, both for the school and professionally," Montellese said. "I didn't do a lot of it freshman year, and I missed it. I got back into it last year, and this year I'm even more into it."

Assistant director Aryn Gabai (sophomore-science) said he is enthusiastic about this weekend's performances.

"It's definitely unlike any other show I've ever done. It's a great combination of so many different fun elements coming together," Gabai said. "And the skits are all humorous, but not stupid-funny."

Rebecca Schnitzer (sophomore-division of undergraduate studies) plays a smitten mayfly by the name of May in Time Flies.

She and "love bug" Horace, played by Nate Kushner (senior-English), act out a love story based around the fact that mayflies' life spans are limited to 24 hours.

"The two of us are getting to know each other, and we're watching TV and a documentary comes on about mayflies, and we realize we're the kind of mayflies that only live 24 hours; we meet, we mate, we produce offspring and we die," Schnitzer said. "We go through pretty much all the phases in the play: the meeting, the mating, just not the producing offspring."

And as far as the NRT experience, "It's been incredible," Schnitzer said.

Jim Fleckenstein (senior-history) acts in a skit called The Philadelphia as a character named Mark who is having a terrible day.

"Everything he wants to do, the opposite happens," Fleckenstein said. "Then he runs into his acquaintance, Al, who explains that Mark is in a place called 'the Philadelphia' where this kind of stuff happens to you."

The remainder of the play is based around efforts to get out of "Philadelphia," with a bit of a surprise ending.

The narrator of English Made Simple, Kristen Linker (junior-advertising/public relations), summarizes the theme of the play with this opening line: "The first three minutes of a conversation between two people can determine their relationship for the rest of eternity."

Meghan McCloskey (junior-chemical and nuclear engineering) plays half of a couple at a toga party in this skit.

At the party, the social interactions between two partygoers are analyzed and in part "translated" by a narrator to decode their hidden meanings.

"It explores how relationships can go and how people interact," McCloskey said. "It's a little glimpse into how conversation can be interpreted."

And at the same time, the play still manages to maintain the light, comedic note that peppers all six mini-plays.

Gabai said he wishes to quiet potential audience members' fears that six plays squeezed into one show may amount to an overly time-consuming evening.

"They're short. The whole show will take an hour and a half, max," he said.

Admission to the show is free and open to the public.