The Minneapolis-based Playwrights’ Center has a unique mission – distributing seed money and creative support to local dramatists – and it has long been a welcome part of the Twin Cities’ theatre community. But a new artistic director has begun to take the center in new directions, some of which have ruffled some powerful feathers. Now, the controversy over the center’s direction has burst into the open with the wide distribution of a scathing e-mail written by a local playwright and former theatre critic. The e-mail may even have caused the center to lose $25,000 in funding from a local foundation.