Steve Martin’s weeklong San Francisco gig in 1975 ‘convinced him not to quit comedy’

After years of lugging around his act, Martin found himself in the spring of 1975 seriously contemplating quitting comedy after a disastrous run at the Playboy Club in the city’s Financial District. In “Steve! (Martin): A Documentary in 2 Pieces,” Morgan Neville’s two-part film on the comedian, San Francisco is home to both the lowest point of Martin’s career and the start of his meteoric rise, all within a few months. It’s a pivotal point in part one of the documentary, which covers his rise to becoming arguably the biggest...