August 11 2010 @ 12:03:58 PM
PuSh International Performing Arts Festival Presents
The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs
Created and Performed by Mike Daisey
Directed by Jean-Michele Gregory
Directed by Jean-Michele Gregory
Thursday, September 2, 2010
7:00pm (doors open one hour prior)
Vancity Theatre (1181 Seymour Street, Vancouver)
Tickets $40
SOLD OUT!
A limited number of tickets will be released at the door at 6pm on the day of the performance
A limited number of tickets will be released at the door at 6pm on the day of the performance
The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs is the newest work by critically acclaimed performer and monologist Mike Daisey. Heralded as “one of the finest solo performers of his generation” by the New York Times, Mike Daisey reveals the fascinating story of Apple CEO Steve Jobs—a real-life Willy Wonka whose deep obsessions have shaped our modern age. Tracing his meteoric rise Daisey shows us how, in our lifetime, controlling our interface has become the key to controlling the world itself—and how the digital tools we use every day change us as they tell our stories.
Breaking free of the virtual, Daisey follows the trail all the way to China where millions of workers toil in factories to create iPhones and iPods in a world we pretend does not exist. A darkly hilarious tale of pride, beauty, lust, and industrial design, Daisey illuminates the war to control how we see the world, and the human price we are willing to pay for our technology.
The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs is a PuSh+ presentation (a work featured outside the Festival’s typical mid-winter schedule), created and performed by Mike Daisey and directed by Jean-Michele Gregory. The PuSh Festival is delighted to have Daisey back in Vancouver after his exhilarating performance of Monopoly! Tesla, Edison, Microsoft, Wal-Mart and the War For Tomorrow to a capacity crowd at Club PuSh in 2009.
Stick around after the performance for a post-show reception where audience members will get the opportunity to meet the artists and enter a raffle to win a brand new iPad.
“The insightful hostility of the best comedy.”
THE NEW YORKER
“Absolutely brilliant.”
SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
“Sharp-witted, passionately delivered talk at once utterly individual and achingly universal.”
BOSTON GLOBE
Presented with the generous support of the Vancouver International Film Centre.
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Links
- RSVP to this event on facebook
- Visit Mike Daisey online
- Read the Wikipedia entry on Steve Jobs and the Bio of Steve Jobs on the Apple Website
- Watch a YouTube clip of Mike Daisey on David Letterman
- Visit Mike Daisey's Youtube Channel for lots of clips!
- Buy tickets online now at www.viff.org
- Visit Mike Daisey online
- Read the Wikipedia entry on Steve Jobs and the Bio of Steve Jobs on the Apple Website
- Watch a YouTube clip of Mike Daisey on David Letterman
- Visit Mike Daisey's Youtube Channel for lots of clips!
- Buy tickets online now at www.viff.org
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Artist Bios
MIKE DAISEY has been called “the master storyteller” and “one of the finest solo performers
of his generation” by the New York Times for his groundbreaking monologues which weave
together autobiography, gonzo journalism, and unscripted performance to tell hilarious and
heartbreaking stories that cut to the bone, exposing secret histories and unexpected
connections. His monologues include last season’s critically acclaimed The Last Cargo Cult,
the controversial How Theater Failed America, the six-hour epic Great Men of Genius, the
unrepeatable series All Stories Are Fiction, and the international sensation 21 Dog Years. He
has performed across five continents, ranging from Off-Broadway at the Public Theater to
remote islands in the South Pacific, from the Sydney Opera House to abandoned theaters in
post-Communist Tajikistan. He’s been a guest on the Late Show with David Letterman, as well
as a commentator and contributor to WIRED, Vanity Fair, Slate, Salon, NPR and the BBC. His
first film, Layover, was shown at the Cannes Film Festival this year, and a feature film of his
monologue If You See Something Say Something is currently in post production. His second
book, Rough Magic, a collected anthology of his monologues, will be published in 2011. He
has been nominated for the Outer Critics Circle Award, two Drama League Awards, and is the
recipient of the Bay Area Critics Circle Award, four Seattle Times Footlight Awards, the Sloan
Foundation’s Galileo Prize, and a MacDowell Fellowship.
JEAN-MICHELE GREGORY works as a director, editor, and dramaturg, focusing on
extemporaneous theatrical works that live in the moment they are told. Working primarily with
solo artists, for the last decade she has collaborated with monologist Mike Daisey, directing at
venues across the globe including the Public Theater, the Sydney Opera House, Yale
Repertory Theatre, the Cherry Lane Theater, the Under the Radar Festival, Woolly Mammoth
Theatre, the Barrow Street Theatre, Chicago’s Museum for Contemporary Art, American
Repertory Theatre, the Spoleto Festival, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, the Noorderzon Festival,
Intiman Theatre, Performance Space 122, the T:BA Festival, and many more. She has also
directed New York storyteller Martin Dockery (Wanderlust, The Surprise) and the Seattle-
based performer and writer Suzanne Morrison (Yoga Bitch, Optimism). Her productions have
received four Seattle Times Footlight Awards (21 Dog Years, The Ugly American, Monopoly!,
The Last Cargo Cult), the Bay Area Critics Circle Award (Great Men of Genius), and
nominations from the Drama League and Outer Critics Circle (If You See Something Say
Something).
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Upcoming PuSh Festival Jan 18 - Feb 6, 2011July 28 2010 @ 12:19:59 PM
The 2011 PuSh International Performing Arts Festival is scheduled to take place
January 18 - February 6, 2011.
Executive Director Norman Armour and Senior Curator Sherrie Johnson are already hard at work on the programming for the Festival's 7th instalment.
Plans will include a suite of works that reflect upon Vancouver's 125th Anniversary, shows from the UK, Argentina, Australia, Belgium, the US, Poland and Germany, along with the triumphant return of Club PuSh and the PuSh Assembly networking conference. Join the mailing list and be the first to find out when the festival schedule is announced!
2010 Annual Report
The 2010 PuSh International Performing Arts Festival Annual Report is now available!
CLICK HERE to download a PDF version of this report.
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THANK YOUFebruary 11 2010 @ 2:22:43 PM
Thank you for making the 2010 PuSh Festival a success!
This year, Festival attendance exceeded projections and of the 14 unique works, 7 were performed to capacity crowds. Line-ups formed hours before show time for a chance at rush tickets to the sold-out run of Hotel Modern's heartbreaking KAMP. Over all performances, average house capacity was approximately 85%.
The Festival proved to be a critical success with works hailed as "wildly ambitions" and "profound and entertaining" (Janet Smith, The Georgia Straight), "aesthetically stunning and mind-bending" (Kirstie McCallum, Plank Magazine) and "wildly imaginative and utterly inspired" (Peter Birnie, The Vancouver Sun).
"The Festival team has been in planning for over two years to meet the challenges and seize the opportunities in 2010. The excellence, energy and sheer range of work captured the imagination of a diverse and passionate audience. A big thank you is owed to all those who participated, lent their support and took in a performance. You have ensured that PuSh is alive and well!"
- Norman Armour, Executive Director
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PuSh Festival Welcomes Interim Managing Director Kent GallieJanuary 1 2010 @ 9:52:12 PM
PuSh International Performing Arts Festival Executive Director Norman Armour announced today that Kent Gallie will be taking the position of interim Managing Director for the 2011 PuSh Festival. "Kent Gallie is one of those individuals who form the cornerstone of any vibrant arts community. Resiliency, resourcefulness, determination—they are mantras for these current times. These words also capture the qualities that Kent will bring to the Interim Managing Director position.”
Managing Director Minna Schendlinger will be on maternity leave immediately following the 2010 festival, and will be returning in the spring of 2011. "I couldn't be happier about Kent's appointment to this position. It is going to be a real boon to the organization and the community to have him here for the next year.”
Kent Gallie has worked for the past two and a half years as Outreach Manager for MusicFest Vancouver (formerly Festival Vancouver) coordinating the organization’s province wide 30 concert Spectacular Music BC series, as well as playing an integral role in the production of the annual two week international music festival.
Prior to joining MusicFest Vancouver Kent spent 11 years as Production Stage Manager with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. His tenure with the ESO included the transition of the orchestra into the new Francis Winspear Centre for Music and coordinating the annual Symphony Under the Sky Festival. He also served a 4 year term as Festival Liaison on the Edmonton Arts Council Board of Directors, providing a voice for the local festival community at the Board level and chairing a number of peer juries administering municipal grants to established and emerging festival organizations. Kent is a graduate of the University of Alberta’s Bachelor of Fine Arts Acting program and has worked for a variety of theatre, film and television production companies as an actor, stage manager and technician. He also works as a Front of House Manager at the Cultch.
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PuSh Assembly on hold for 2010January 1 2010 @ 9:23:58 PM
Please note that due to recent federal funding cuts to the international programs PromArt and Trade Routes, the PuSh Festival will not be producing the PuSh Assembly in 2010. Instead, we will take a year to reflect, so that we can come back with a stronger forum in 2011 that benefits our community and responds to our new world.
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