I wrote the first draft of this play in Christine Scarfuto’s Adaptation class at Hunter College. I remember lying in bed and calculating how many lifetimes had elapsed between Euripides and me: 2,463 years, divided by Alcestis’ optimistic estimate of a 95 year lifespan, works out to a stunningly low 26 lifetimes. Twenty-six people between Alcestis and us! A mere Major League Baseball roster’s worth.

What attracted me to Alcestis was its strangeness — not quite tragedy, not quite comedy, the play confounds categorization. It is ironic and lyrical; it has stunningly contemporary moments of social awkwardness. I wanted Catch to match the original play’s idiosyncrasy, its odd mix of elements. Their very weirdness felt true. So why baseball, or classical violin? Well: why theater for that matter? To devote a lifetime to any particular pursuit, or any particular person, is on some level an absurd choice, in the sense that death renders any commitment absurd. But the gods remain children in Catch because they don’t understand death. Alcestis’ choice to die for Admetus may be absurd — even wrong — but it opens her ears to a music that neither Admetus nor the gods can hear.

-Davis Alianiello