The Community Players of Concord will present John Cariani’s Last Gas this week at the Concord City Auditorium.
Cariani hails from way-northern Maine, and his plays are set in that sparsely-populated region on the edge of what’s wild and what’s not. Concord audiences have seen two other Cariani plays in recent years: Almost, Maine, produced by the players in February 2011, and Love/Sick at the Hatbox Theatre in September 2018.
Last Gas is set in a very small, unincorporated town near the Canadian border. Nat Paradis, almost 41, runs the convenience store he’ll inherit from his father, Dwight, a 63-year-old who likes dating young Canadian women. Paradis’ Last Convenient Store is the final stop for fuel and supplies before leaving the U.S. It may also prove to be the last stop for some of life’s most universal events: love, loss, connection, and joy.
Nat never married Cherry-Tracy (a forest ranger who fancies herself The Law) – but they have a teenage son, Troy, 16, a tall young man with bigger dreams than this small town can hold. When Nat’s high school girlfriend, Lureen, comes home from New York to bury her mother, he gets a chance to rekindle a romance he gave up on 21 years ago, but his best friend from high school has bought him tickets to a Red Sox game in Boston for his birthday, a perfect road trip for these devoted Red Sox fans.
Wayland Bunnell (from way-northern New Hampshire) directs, and says “There are other things besides moose that can wander onto our paths and make big changes. Last Gas is a sweet, funny, moving and thought-provoking look at love, and what it means to ‘get back to happy.’ ”
Showtimes will be Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. at the Concord City Auditorium, 2 Prince St., Concord. Tickets for reserved seating are available at communityplayersofconcord.org or by contacting Box Office chair David Murdo at nhdm40@comcast.net or by calling (603) 344-4747. Tickets are $20 for adults and $18 for children (17 and younger) and seniors (65 and older). There is a $2 discount per ticket if bought by May 4.