There's always next year

Abstract

Everyone experiences loss in their life in some way or another. Whether it is the loss of a job, the loss of a game, or the loss of a loved one, losing is a part of life. For fans of the Chicago Cubs professional baseball team, loss is an integral part of fan culture, as the franchise has not won a World Series, the highest achievement in baseball, in over one hundred years. Yet there remains a passionate legion of Cubs fans who cheer for their team despite all of their misgivings. Most have gone an entire lifetime without seeing the Cubs win a championship, which causes a unique intergenerational experience amongst fans. Through the medium of a stage play, I seek to explore how Cubs fans deal with loss. I examine how individuals who are used to losing cope with terminal illness, such as cancer, and I seek to explore what does this do to their relationships, and how their outlook on life changes. The characters use the stage as their platform to integrate sports and life into verbal, visual and physical metaphors that can't be captured simply by the written word.