Steve Jobs by way of Robby McGhee

About a year ago in March of 2012, public radio's This American Life had made a point of retracting a story they had originally aired in January of 2012. The title of that specific show was Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory. It had come to their awareness that the story, which talked about Apple Computer's corporate presence in China, "contained significant fabrications." Said the show's host Ira Glass: "We're retracting the story because we can’t vouch for its truth. This is not a story we commissioned. It was an excerpt of Mike Daisey's acclaimed one-man show "The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs," in which he talks about visiting a factory in China that makes iPhones and other Apple products."

This American Life wouldn't pull a story without significant reason to. . . and they even went so far as to air an entire episode to revealing the errors in Daisey's script. In his announcement, Glass went on: "Daisey lied to me and to This American Life producer Brian Reed during the fact checking we did on the story, before it was broadcast." 

So it's a fabrication that  took an entire hour on public radio to straighten out . . . okay. . . but that doesn't mean that it can't be fun, right? When confronted about the errors, Daisey said, "…it's not journalism. It's theater."

Daisey's non-journalistic theatre gets a local staging at the end of next month in a production featuring Robby McGhee in The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs. And I guess that's what I'm really looking forward to here . . . Robbhy McGhee who had put in such interesting performances with World's Stage Theatre and T.I.M.--The Improvised Musical among others should bring an interesting personality to the stage. Sounds like a fun fabrication . . . 

Robby McGhee in The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs runs May 31st through June 2nd at the Next Act Theatre Space on 255 South Water Street. It is a World's Stage Theatre production. Tickets can be purchased by calling 414-278-0765.