Detained in the Desert is a play that chronicles the parallel lives of two completely different people who are having the same experience at the same time. Sandi, a second generation Latin woman, and Lou, a Howard Stern-like talk show host with a talent for inflaming any situation, both find themselves detained in the Arizona desert. Sandi has been pulled over by the police, and taken to a detention center when she refuses to hand over her paperwork on principle because she feels that she has been racially profiled. Lou has bein kidnapped by the surviving sons of a man killed by racists whom the sons feel were inspired by Lou's rhetoric to do so.
When Lou is set free by one of his kidnappers, and Sandi escapes after the immigration center bus she is riding on crashes, the two find themselves reliant upon each other, and both quickly find out how difficult life can be for immigrants hiding out in the desert.
Lopez was inspired to write the play as a response to what she felt was a significant anti-immigrant sentiment in Arizona fueled largely by the media. The play was adapted for the big screen by Real Women Have Curves studio and was financially backed by Lopez's own non-profit organization CASA 0101.
Lopez is a Chicana playwright, and is best known for the play Real Women Have Curves, after which her production company was named. There have been over one hundred productions of her plays across the United States. She wrote her first play, Simply Maria, whilst she was still in high school.
