Don’t get Mike Daisey started on Steve Jobs. On second thought — do! This brash maestro of the monologue takes the wizardly leader of Apple out to the digital woodshed in his latest solo show, a blisteringly funny, icily penetrating account of the extraordinary influence and not-so-benign impact the man and his company have had on the world.
“The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs” is hands-down Daisey’s most effective performance yet, in a catalogue that includes such impressive pieces as “The Last Cargo Cult” and “If You See Something Say Something.” What sets apart this new work at Woolly Mammoth Theatre is Daisey’s subtler grasp of the subject at hand: our obsession with acquiring 21st-century gadgetry while remaining blissfully ignorant of the dark facts of how it might be manufactured overseas.
As a self-professed “Apple fanboy” — “I love the smell of a new piece of technology,” he declares — Daisey entertainingly outlines a landscape of his own obsession with cellphones and MacBooks over the course of nearly two hours. His habit is such that he’d be a candidate for a spinoff addiction reality TV series — “Intervention: Handheld Devices.” He tells us, for example, that relaxation for him is breaking down his expensive laptop into its 40-odd component parts and meticulously putting them all back in place.
What’s important about this compulsive credential is that it not only lays the foundation for his authority on the topic, but it also inspires some of the best writing for the stage Daisey has ever done. Whether he is ruminating on the hellish torments of PowerPoint presentations or describing the horrific dormitory conditions for Chinese electronics workers, who sleep in stacks “like Jenga puzzle pieces,” the narrator employs language that is richly but not overly ornamented, and at all times emotionally accessible.
Sometimes, admittedly, Daisey’s emotions can get the better of him, in both hilarious ways and less useful ones. His ability to get his dander up is almost endearing: It has become such a visceral part of his makeup that he’s developed a theatrical vocal reflex for it, a kind of yelp of anger that comes out like a furious sneeze. These momentary explosions are often accompanied by some choice, amusingly passionate epithets.
But passion can overtake craft, as it does at present in the final several minutes of the monologue, when Daisey’s sense of outrage at the injustices he encountered while reporting out “The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs” lapses into righteous indignation. Having recounted for us some shocking vignettes of how Apple products are made in an industrial zone in Shenzhen, China, he can’t resist hammering home a sermon.
Are you a storyteller or an activist, Mr. Daisey? (He’s also a bit unfair, I think, in singling out the New York Times for not digging into the story.) It is admirable that the monologist wants to move us so that we might help make change happen; he even has ushers distribute pamphlets at the exit, explaining the “concrete steps you can take.”
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