Peter Paton, farmer/dramatist: In town for the show

Story and photos by William Lannon

Stories abound of fresh-faced farm girls who, discovered, strike it rich as actresses on Broadway or in Hollywood. Almost as familiar are the tales of theater folk who, like Mickey Rooney, retire to gentleman farming far away from the crowds who ensured their success.

Less familiar are the stories of people like Peter Paton who, “over-educated” in his words, look to broaden a life spent on the farm and seek more artistic, if not greener, pastures in which to labor.

Peter Paton examines the inner workings of his hay baler. Equally at home with a deus ex machina, Paton farms and writes in Troy and will be bringing his new play to Camden on Friday, September 12.

Paton, now in his fifties, was born into a family which farmed in Western Massachusetts near North Adams, but moved to Maine in 1955 when they bought a 700-acre farm off Route 9 in Troy. The family and Paton have lived and worked there on Myrick Road ever since.

Paton, with his wife Joyce, and, as he puts it, “excellent help,” organically grow summer and winter squash, zucchini, gourds, lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes and cucumbers. They sell their produce to Hannaford and at farmers’ markets throughout the area. The farm also supports some 40 head of Holstein and Ayreshire cattle. Paton credits Joyce for what’s been accomplished at the farm. Those who work the small family farms are often, like the one-boat lobsterman, the quintessential entrepreneur, the only link between the source and the table.

Paton produces a good deal of hay, as well. He uses round bales, which weigh about 700 pounds, because they withstand the weather better and don’t have to be brought undercover immediately, as the smaller familiar rectangular bales do.

When he first went off to college in 1964, Paton majored, as might be expected, in agriculture at the University of Maine in Orono and received a Bachelor of Science in 1968. Then it was back to the farm.

Paton doesn’t elaborate on just why he returned to school beyond saying, “I got involved in writing in the late ’80s after almost 20 years of being too tired at night for anything except sleeping in front of the TV.” In any case, he earned a Bachelor of Arts in 1990 with distinction in English from Orono and during that time, continued writing stories and novels. The following year, he worked as a graduate teaching assistant in English. More importantly perhaps, in 1990 he directed and acted in his own play, Whiteout. It turned out that he enjoyed theater.

Concerning his involvement with theater, Paton remarks, “I was still restless and in the mid-’90s started acting with the Maskers in Belfast, and have since performed with the Assembled Players, the Playhouse, and with Playing in Traffic. They have all done well to endure me.”

Paton has indeed appeared in a goodly number of plays, eight of which were produced by the Belfast Maskers. During his time with the Maskers, he acted for Basil Burwell in the acclaimed productions of The Good Woman of Setzuan and Sweeney Among the Nightingales. He also played the gravedigger in the Masker’s production of Hamlet.

Paton went back to school again. On his way to earning his Master of Arts in theater from Orono in 2000, he took on Beckett’s extremely challenging Krapp’s Last Tape, a one-man show which requires sincere interaction with bananas and a tape recorder. Krapp is an introspective and maudlin failed writer who at one point bleakly assesses the progress of his career, “Seventeen copies sold...gettin’ known.” Clearly, Paton himself plays in a different league. He has aggressively launched himself into a variety of projects.

As an actor, Paton did not confine himself to the theater. He also appeared in the locally famous Stephen King film Thinner and performed in a feature called Haunted Maine for the History Channel. He has done film shoots for Francesca Galesi at the International Film Workshop in Rockport, appeared in a television ad for the Animal House Pet Supply in Fairfield, and most recently acted in Funny Papers, a television pilot project for Northwolf Productions in Northwood, New Hampshire.

In October, Paton will be traveling to New York City. He has been invited to audition for NBC’s Saturday Night Live.
Paton’s aspirations are not confined to performing. He has written a number of plays and sketches that have been performed in Unity and at the Belfast By The Bay Festival.

Peter Paton stands near a sign that doesn’t suggest the efficiency of the farm bearing his family’s name. More telling is the new tractor in the background.

State-wide Tour
Now, however, Paton has created a full-length play, which he has been performing around the state. So far, his two-hour work, The Peter Principle, has played Belfast, Portland, Orono on the University of Maine campus, and Unity. He will be bringing the show to the Camden Opera House at 7:30 p.m., Friday, September 12. Paton says that the play is “about the deeds and misdeeds of the main character, Phoenix, and his stumbling attempts to get his life together.”

Paton is charging $10 for admission to the event because, as he points out, while his “activities are already bringing him national attention,” most of it is coming “from credit card companies who would like to see something for payment on overdue bills.” He says that the show did well in Belfast and Unity, but received no attention at all in Portland. Undaunted, he is hoping for better in Camden.

The Peter Principle is comprised of a series of sketches about the vicissitudes of farm life. One scene depicts an encounter between the farmer and a tourist at a farmers’ market. The “urbanite” customer is a crass fellow who opens the transaction by yelling at the farmer from his vehicle.

“What’cha got there, farmer? Can you hand me a couple of those cukes? I’m short on time today.” (Waits for response, gets none. He speaks again.) “Hey farmer boy, can’t ya hear? Got the feet caught in the ol’ pig slop have we?” (Farmer is tending his display. Ignores customer in car. Customer speaks again.) “Bashful are we? C’mon, march those cukes right over here. I got cash. Got milk, got cash. Ha!”

Finally, the farmer decides to notice him, “Excuse me, I’m looking for a drive-through window. I don’t see one, do you? Or golden arches or a big whopper. This is a farmers’ market, not a fast food crap shoot. Self help and self service here. Nobody helped my wife and kids and me grow all this stuff, spent a whole day picking, washing, sorting just for this display...”

As the exchange continues, the farmer manages to achieve the upper hand, until at the scene’s conclusion, the farmer turns the tables on the sophisticated customer, “Fifty cents each, four cukes, that’ll be three dollars. Come around often? Next week we’ll have new shell beans and winter squash.”

Not all the scenes strike a cheerful note. In a sobering segment, a farming couple is trying to get an appraisal of their property. They go to an appraiser at a television show reminiscent of the popular PBS vehicle, The Antiques Roadshow.

Man: “We would like to make enough to retire on.”

Woman: “There’s never been enough income for saving.”

Appraiser: “Then why do you bother farming? Me, I save a third of my income every month. All my wife’s income goes into the bank. You have to plan, you know.”

Man: “The barn is full of hay.”

The end of this sequence satisfies the audience, but the hard truths about farming, which Paton reveals, will not do much to lure people back to the land. Still, this aspiring actor and dramatist has no intention of leaving the land for good. “I wouldn’t put the farm in a position not to exist. And he rules out selling the property to developers. He declares, “I’d rather go broke or give it to a foundation.”

Neither of the paths Peter Paton has chosen promise easy riches. Indeed, the farming path seems to promise no riches at all. Both paths can flay the spirit of all but the hardiest. Yet Paton, whatever else may happen, will remain his own man, working to support himself and his family. He would seem to epitomize the truly independent contractor. Paton’s story should make customers think twice about being condescending at the next farmers market they visit. Their words and attitudes may be getting chronicled for posterity. Peter Paton makes you think more than twice about the wisdom of stereotyping people.

FMI and tickets, contact Peter Paton, P.O. Box 404, Unity, ME 04988, or email, <peter_paton@yahoo.com>.