Finding plays to read is hard.

I've been approached by my friend Brandon to direct a play for Sandhill, his new theatre company that was recently featured on Chris Jones's blog.  This is exciting for me because as much as I love my home I know that I need to start taking more steps outside that comfort zone if I want to keep growing as an artist.

What I like about Sandhill is its focus on the Midwest.  Brandon and I had a great meeting this morning where we talked about the company and his focus and came to the conclusion that the Midwest has all sorts of stories that are fascinating and just aren't being told.  There seems to be this misconception that the Midwest is made up of various shades of beige and that the things worth talking (or writing a play) about are only happening on the coasts.  That's just silly.  And I'm glad that Brandon's doing something about it and that he's asked me to help him do something about it this season.  

So, here's the problem.  I need a play to direct.  It needs to speak to the Midwestern experience in some way, and needs to fit into the theme that's emerged in the season - questioning death.  Fascinating parameters - but I'm not really sure where to start.  There isn't a resource of plays dealing with the Midwest really.  In fact we seem to, as theatre artists, feel the need to apologize in a way for setting anything regionally in a way that New York plays would never dream of doing.  

So, if anyone has any suggestions, I'm open to 'em.  Because there're a lot of plays out there and I'll take all the help I can get.

PS - on a totally unrelated note - have you seen this new Genius Bar thing in iTunes?  You pick a song and it makes a playlist of songs that you have that are like it in some way.  It's kind of frightening.  And I think I'm in love with it.