Caryl Churchill is famous—or perhaps infamous—for taking bold leaps in her plays and circumventing both theatrical conventions and audience expectations, leveraging both fantasy and surrealism to comment on the world as it is and as it could be. A series of her one-act-plays, now running at the Public Theater through May 11, is an excellent sampler of her unique style—but unfortunately, Glass. Kill. What If If Only. Imp is uneven in balancing that style with substance.

The first act is the first three plays, with the much longer one, Imp, making up act two of the evening. Glass follows several inanimate objects that may or may not be sentient (it’s unclear) while Kill follows a single deity (maybe—it’s unclear) discussing horrific brutality and murder. What If, If Only follows the ghosts (or future ghosts—it’s unclear) haunting a grieving widower, and Imp follows roommates and their extended circle as they struggle to remain sane in an increasingly maddening world—and possibly set a supernatural creature free to wreak havoc. But the imp may not exist at all. It’s unclear.

Churchill’s frequent lack of clarity is what makes her plays so wonderfully thought-provoking, but in this evening, only Imp really seems to hit its mark. The rest of the plays—though certainly inventive—end before we can fully grasp their deeper meanings and feel the full emotional impact.

The ensemble works excellently both as individuals and as a whole, creating worlds out of words and emotion. Tony-winner Deidre O’Connell gets some of the meatiest moments and makes them shine, conveying ennui and rage with equal skill. John Ellison Conlee gets decidedly less to do in the first act but is wonderfully powerful in Imp, simultaneously funny and tragic as a man unsure of what to believe. Ayana Workman is especially poignant in Glass and Sathya Sridharan is quietly devastating in What If If Only.

In between the first and second plays, circus performers Junru Wang and Maddox Morfit-Tighe perform to cover scene changes, balancing and juggling and performing increasingly impressive feats. It’s a nice throwback to the classic tradition of clowns performing in between vaudeville scenes—but also a nice metaphor for the chaos of the short plays.

Miriam Buether’s sets range from surreal to photorealistic, but her set for Kill is especially effective: a cloud, suspended several feet above the stage where O’Connell sits barefoot (Enber Chakartash’s costumes also tell us much about the characters and their feelings). Isabella Byrd’s lights also move effectively from realism to surreal and back again, nicely setting the mood of each short play.

Caryl Churchill has been one of the most dynamic voices in theater for decades, and if this collection of short plays does not hit as powerfully as Cloud 9 or Top Girls, it is still a chance to see a masterful artist continuing to create original, inventive plays.