One Show to Laugh With, Another to Sock You in the Gut

What a weekend -- two fantastic shows, both completely different. For pure escapism Saturday night there was a remake of Alfred Hitchcock's "The Thirty Nine Steps," at Theatreworks in Mountain View, which was inspired silliness and belly laughs; last night was Mike Daisey's "The Agony and Ecstacy of Steve Jobs" which will be one of the best shows of this year or any year. Funny but gut-wrenching, this Mike Daisey show helps Plotnik understand why there is so much buzz out there about this man. You can read both San Francisco Theater Blog reviews here.

The Thirty Nine Steps

The Agony and Ecstacy of Steve Jobs


It must be a lot of fun to put on a show like The Thirty Nine Steps, where four actors play at least forty roles. It can't be fun to do The Agony and Ecstacy of Steve Jobs every night, because Mike Daisey agonizes over the dichotomy we all should face but don't: Cool, brilliantly designed Apple products made by hundreds of thousands of Chinese laborers working under conditions unimaginable to Americans.