'Cabaret' and 'Master Harold and the Boys' on ATC's 2019-20 season

Arizona Theatre Company intends to make us laugh — and cry — with its 2019-20 season of plays.

Laughter will come with “The Legend of Georgia McBride” (March 7-28, 2020), about an Elvis impersonator who discovers a lucrative form of entertaining: drag shows. And the tears may flow with the musical, “Cabaret” (Nov. 30-Dec. 20), which takes place at the dawn of the Nazis’ takeover in Germany, and in “Master Harold and the Boys” (Jan. 18-Feb. 8), Athol Fugard’s piercing drama about the devastation and bigotry that roared in the early days of South Africa’s apartheid.

But all of the plays announced are ultimately about triumph, says David Ivers, ATC’s artistic director.

“The season is about the triumphant spirit of the individual,” he says. “They celebrate the kind of audacity and sometimes danger and risk and joy of the individual and what they contribute to the larger picture of who we are.”

Also announced for this season is “Silent Sky” (Oct. 22-Nov. 9), based on the story of Henrietta Leavitt, a 19th century astronomer who didn’t let the fact that she wasn’t allowed to look through the telescopes at Harvard College Observatory because she was a woman stand in the way of her discovering a method to determine the distance to stars.

“It’s a stunning play and anyone living in Arizona knows how relevant it is to where we live. It’s surprising and touching and adventurous.”

While the 2019-20 season will have six plays, only four have been announced. Ivers, who has been at ATC for two years, leaves in March to be artistic director at South Coast Repertory Theatre. While that is a dream job, leaving isn’t easy.

“Tucson is a beautiful community,” he says. “I felt welcomed and the city was graceful about my early exit.”

Ivers leaves the selection of the final two plays of the next season to his successor.

Billy Russo, ATC’s Managing Director, says a national search for a new artistic director is near a close.

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“We’ve narrowed it down to finalists,” he says.

Meanwhile, Ivers is pumped about the final plays he has chosen for ATC.

“‘Georgia McBride’ is such a great underdog story, and it’s damn funny,” he says about the Matthew Lopez play.

The season opener, “Silent Sky,” by Lauren Gunderson, is “surprising and touching and adventurous,” says Ivers. “It’s a very beautiful, personal play.”

Ivers was first introduced to Fugard and “Master Harold” when he was in college and has been a big fan ever since.

“‘Master Harold’ felt like a story that needed to be told again. It’s a revelation and a surprise about how human beings operate on every level.”

And “Cabaret” just felt right for the year after the mid-term elections.

“It’s a love story and it has undertones that should be examined again,” he says. “It holds up a mirror in a way; it makes us see how far and not far we have come.”

Season tickets go on sale Feb. 18 for subscribers to the full season; flex tickets for three, four or five plays will be sold starting March 11. Tickets for new subscribers will be available March 18. Prices for the full season are $157-$394.

For more information, call 622-2823 or go to arizonatheatre.org.