Leaving Iowa Takes a Poignant, Funny Road Trip
BY MAUREEN LEARY
-MADISON ISTHMUS
“Adventures in Iowa are like steep hills – pretty hard to come by” Also, hard to come by are humorous plays about the Midwest that don’t reduce Midwesterners to chirpy, folksy caricatures. Leaving Iowa achieves just this with its smart, funny and at time’s poignant look at what it meant to grow up in, and ultimately leave, small-town Iowa. The script travels deftly from laugh out loud funny to poignant and back again, its pathos always tempered by humor
Leaving Iowa is about appreciating those people who are generally rather reluctant to call attention to themselves. It’s a love letter to practical parents and their everyday sacrifices, a valentine to all the unsung heroes of the flyover states.
