[2] When Steinbeck found out that there was interest in turning Cannery Row into a Broadway musical, he wrote Sweet Thursday as a more Broadway-friendly piece.

Doc returns to a failed Western Biological Laboratories and a changed Cannery Row after serving in the army during World War II.

Mack and the Boys are still living in the Palace Flophouse, but Lee Chong has sold his general store to Joseph and Mary Rivas.

Fauna knows Suzy isn't cut out to be a working girl, but her soft heart always causes her to fall for a hard luck story.

Choosing to live alone, Suzy moves into an empty boiler in a vacant lot and takes a job at the local diner, the Golden Poppy.

While Cannery Row is stunned over Suzy's actions and Doc wrestles with a critical project, Hazel, one of the Boys living in the Palace Flophouse, struggles with his own demons.

To practice for high office, Hazel understands that he must learn to make difficult decisions — one of which is breaking Doc's arm, for he's realized that this, arousing Suzy's sympathy, is the only way to bring the couple together.

Hazel, a simple minded but good hearted-young man who sometimes goes on marine specimen hunting trips with Doc, is the most prominent of Mack's boys who hunker down at the Palace Flophouse.

In addition to running the store, Joseph is a labor contractor for undocumented workers from Mexico and serves as an agent for his nephew's salsa band.