One Blue Tarp is a two-act, eight character comedy about a man, his tarp and the town that tries to take it away from him. David Stillman, a retired Mainer, has just replaced the old, worn out tarp that covers a heap of odds, ends and whatnots out in his yard with a brand new one. It ought to last ten more years but then he finds out from his neighbor that the town of Clara has recently outlawed blue tarps out in folks yards in an effort to spruce things up a bit and attract more tourists. Not one who likes to be told what to do with his own junk, David vows to fight the new ordinance and the rich woman from away, Gail Pritchard, behind it. Undeterred by the pleas of his wife, Joan, David enlists his grandson, Buddy, to help defend the tarp vowing that they can have it when they "pry it out from under my cold, dead, butt. Meantime, his daughter Judy, a Boston lawyer and also a lesbian, looks to get an injunction against the ordinance while fending off the advances of Gail's daughter, Hester, and the past fancies of Officer Carl Ray who is just trying to keep the peace and get a date to the contra dance. The forces from Maine and away come to a head at a good old fashioned town meeting where tradition meets development and how the way things are wrestles with how life should be. Sometimes we have to let go of the past and all the stuff that reminds us of it, and sometimes freedom is one blue tarp. One Blue Tarp was named the Best of Maine in the 2013 Clauder New England Playwrights Competition and premiered at the Penobscot Theatre Company in Bangor in the winter of 2014 setting box-office records for a non-musical and that with two blizzards.
About the Author: TRAVIS BAKER born in Boston and moved to Texas when he was six. After a brief stint at art school, he began writing plays when he got into the Edward Albee Playwrights Workshop at the University of Houston in 1993. A year later he moved to New York where he had some success with Cold, The Weatherbox, God & Mr. Smith and traumatic failure with Sex & Violence. He won a Berrilla Kerr Award for American Playwrights in 1998. Bitter and burned out he moved to Orono, Maine in 2004 with his wife, Holly, to get his Masters in English at the University of Maine. After graduation he began teaching composition and creative writing at several area colleges and on those drives he began to notice all the blue tarps. After earning his MFA at Fairfield University he wrote One Blue Tarp which won the 2013 Clauder New England Playwrights Prize as the Best of Maine and would premire at the Penobscot Theatre Company in the winter of 2014. The next play in his Clara cycle, Hair Frenzy, will debut at PTC in 2016 to eventually be followed by The Dogs Pond and, we hope, many more. He continues to live in Orono with Holly, their two boys, a little dog and two cats.