“Trivia was literally the Roman god of three-ways. That is, the place where three roads meet, like a T-junction (except that’s where one road ends at another), or a fork (except that’s when one road splits into two), or a cross-roads (except that’s where one road crosses another). Look, I don’t know what-all the Romans were thinking when they said three-ways… well, I can imagine, but that’s none of my business (except I guess it is).
Anyway, Oedipus killed his father, Laius, at a three-way, but he was Greek and Trivia is Roman, so never mind. But road junctions were dangerous places to be, apparently. Hunters put traps there which you could accidentally wander into at night, and brigands used to lurk there so they could make a clean getaway after they briganded you, that kind of thing. So Trivia was supposed to look after travelers.
Here’s some trivia for you: the first three of the seven classical liberal arts (grammar, logic, and rhetoric) are referred to as the “trivium.” I read somewhere that’s because back in the day, teachers of those subjects were poor and had to do their teaching outdoors at crossroads, but that can’t be right. Grammarians, logicians, and rhetoricians have always been fabulously wealthy.
I think at this point, I’m required to say that Trivia is not Hecate, even though she totally is.
My play takes place at a three-way crossroads, where two wandering tramps have met to make a bargain with, they presume, the devil. Also they might be witches, which is pretty Trivial.”
TRIVIA by Alan Coyne
Directed by Stuart Bousel
Staged Reading on October 20, 2018 at The EXIT Theatre
Erika Bakse (Doyle)
Ellen Dunphy (Keane)
Gary Hughes (Stage Directions)
Alan Coyne is an actor who occasionally beautifies himself with playwright’s feathers. This is his third Olympians as a writer, and fifth overall. He has also written for SF Theater Pub, Group Hug sketch comedy, and his third-grade teacher, Mr. Doyle. An excerpt from his musical The Theory of Everything was performed as part of Musical Cafe’s Spring Showcase in June 2016, his play Keane and Doyle are Spies was a finalist in last year’s ShortLived competition at PianoFight, and his play Ducks and Drakes took third place in this year’s Stony Brook University Science Playwriting Competition.
The image of Trivia was created by Nathan Anderson.