Winners and Losers
Two friends pass the time together playing a made-up game in which they name people, places, or things and debate whether they are successful or not; in other words, whether they are winners or losers. Each friend seeks to defeat the other, and because one of these men grew up economically privileged and the other did not, the competition very quickly heats up.
Marcus Youssef is associate artistic producer at Vancouver's NeWorld Theatre and teaches theater at Concordia University in Montreal.
James Long has been making theater since 1995 and is artistic director of Theatre Replacement in Vancouver.
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Many of Marcus’s plays were written or created with friends and colleagues. They include Winners and Losers, Leftovers, Jabber, How Has My Love Affected You?, Ali and Ali and the aXes of Evil, Adrift, Peter Panties, and A Line in the Sand. These have been performed across North America, Australia, and Europe, and recently off-Broadway. Marcus’s plays are also translated into multiple languages and published by Talonbooks and Playwrights Canada Press.
Major awards include Alcan Performing Arts, Chalmer’s Canadian Play, Arts Club Silver Commission, Seattle Times Footlight, Vancouver Critics’ Choice Innovation, and numerous local awards in Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal. Marcus is the winner of the 2017 Victor Martyn Lynch-Staunton Award for writing – the award is given for outstanding artistic achievement by a Canadian mid-career artist.
Well-known in Vancouver as a cultural advocate, Marcus is artistic director of Neworld Theatre, co-founder of Progress Lab 1422, and chair of the city of Vancouver’s Arts and Culture Policy Council.
