Johnathan Lee Iverson brings nearly three decades of circus history back under the big top as Circus Vargas resents ‘Masquerade’ through Sept 21 in Folsom
Johnathan Lee Iverson has stood beneath some very bright lights in some very famous places.He has commanded the floor of Madison Square Garden. He has performed before presidents and dignitaries. His career has put him alongside legendary entertainers, carried him across the country and around the world and ultimately earned him a place in circus history.
But this week, beneath the massive big top tent that has risen at Oak Avenue Parkway and East Bidwell Street, Iverson will once again step into the ring somewhere that has become particularly special to him. He will be back in Folsom.
“Venturing to Folsom is always exciting because we know our fans are anxious to welcome us, which is reflected in the packed houses during our engagement,” Iverson told Folsom Times ahead of this year’s return. “The city feels like home, with some of our favorite places to visit, eat, work out, etc., during our entire tour.”
Circus Vargas returned to Folsom Friday, Sept. 4, bringing its all-new 2026 production, “Masquerade,” to the corner of Oak Avenue Parkway and East Bidwell Street at Lakeside Church. The engagement continues through Sept. 21. For Iverson, however, this stop is about more than simply another city on a tour schedule.
When Folsom Times connected with him during last year’s engagement, the celebrated ringmaster offered an unusually warm assessment of the city, describing Folsom as a mixture of metropolis and suburb with “big city with southern hospitality.” A year and many thousands of miles later, he hasn’t changed his mind.
“Absolutely!” Iverson said when asked if Folsom still deserved the distinction. “I dined at the amazing Pier 50 and indulged my sweet tooth at the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory on the day we arrived and was simply dazzled by the charm of the area. Folsom hasn’t failed me yet and I doubt it ever will.”
It isn’t only what he finds outside the big top that has stayed with him. It is what happens inside.
“The Folsom audience is unapologetically receptive,” he said. “Nothing resonates and energizes my colleagues and I at Circus Vargas like a receptive audience who have no issue expressing their enthusiasm.”
For someone who has spent nearly three decades performing, those reactions still matter. Iverson said performers remember the cities where audiences bring something special to the experience, and Folsom has become one of them.
“We absolutely remember and look forward to the electrifying energy of the people of Folsom,” he said. “It is not lost on us how very accessible entertainment has become. Therefore, for audiences to continue to trust their time, money and imagination to Circus Vargas since 1969 is something we are very grateful for.”
There are familiar stops for him here as well. During the Folsom engagement, Iverson said he enjoys working out at the local In-Shape Family Fitness and spending time at Lakeside Church, the same grounds where the circus makes its temporary home.
It is an interesting word for Iverson — home — because his definition of it has never been confined to a street address.
“Where there’s peace, there’s home,” he said. “Where there’s security and respect, there’s home. Where one is free and even encouraged to pursue their purpose, there’s home. Home is community. Home is sharing. Home is having a stake in the success of another.”
For Iverson, that philosophy has been shaped by a life spent traveling, performing and building a career in one of entertainment’s oldest traditions.
Long before the tailcoat, the booming introductions and the spotlight at center ring, Iverson was a boy growing up in New York City whose voice opened a door to a much larger world. He became a member of the famed Boys Choir of Harlem, an experience he has credited with establishing the discipline and standards that would follow him throughout his career.
At 13, he was selected to tour Japan with the choir — his first trip outside the United States and an experience he later described to Folsom Times as life-changing. The choir was demanding. Excellence was expected, not merely encouraged. Iverson remembered repeatedly hearing the mantra, “Only the pure in tone will survive.”
Being selected for that overseas tour showed him what could come from meeting those expectations. The world, as he described it, suddenly seemed to open. Roughly a decade later, it opened in a way even he could hardly have imagined.
At 23, only months removed from earning his degree in voice performance, Iverson stepped into Madison Square Garden as the new ringmaster of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey. It was not simply another performing job.
Iverson became the youngest ringmaster and the first African American ringmaster in the 146-year history of the legendary circus. When Ringling Bros. ended its long-running production in 2017, Iverson also carried the distinction of becoming its last ringmaster of that era.
His career has placed him among some of entertainment’s most recognizable names, including Lena Horne, Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder, Luciano Pavarotti, Roberta Flack, Plácido Domingo and Tony Bennett. He has performed before Nelson Mandela, Colin Powell and four U.S. presidents. Barbara Walters once named him among her “10 Most Fascinating People,” and his career has even made him the subject of clues on “Jeopardy!”
Yet for all those accomplishments, Iverson’s measure of an audience isn’t based on the fame of the venue or the people occupying the seats.
“An audience is an audience, be it Madison Square Garden or under the Circus Vargas big top in Folsom,” he said.
What makes the latter special, he explained, is proximity.
“I must concede, what makes performing under the Circus Vargas big top, particularly for the likes of the great people of Folsom, is the intimacy between performer and patron,” Iverson said. “I can experience their elation up close and personal and they are not shy about letting me know.”
That intimacy is one of the fundamental differences between the enormous arenas of his Ringling years and the world he now inhabits with Circus Vargas. Last year, Iverson described Ringling Bros. as a “spectacular dream,” but noted that some of the details of a performance could be lost in a venue of that scale. Beneath the Circus Vargas big top, he said, the wonder is much closer. Performers can see faces and hear individual reactions, with the gasps, applause and laughter traveling only a short distance before reaching the ring.
For Iverson, that connection is central to what he does — something he refuses to view as simply a job.
Last year, when asked how much longer he intended to remain in the ring, Iverson didn’t offer a retirement date.
“As long as I enjoy it and the public finds value in what I do, I’ll be around,” he said at the time.
Another year has passed. He is still here, and he says he feels better than ever.
“Thanks to In-Shape Family Fitness, I feel a lot lighter and healthier,” Iverson said. “Even the Circus Vargas audience has taken note of my slimmer look. I feel great and am stronger than ever; and that excites me because I love nothing more than putting forth my best effort, especially for fans that are endeared to me like the people of Folsom.”
After nearly 30 years in the circus industry and thousands of performances, repetition could easily turn the extraordinary into routine. Iverson doesn’t see it that way.
“I am grateful that along with Circus Vargas I am a gleeful participant in what P.T. Barnum called, ‘the noblest art … that of making others happy,’” he said. “Being Ringmaster at Circus Vargas can never be a job, it’s my work. It’s my mission.”
That distinction says much about the way Iverson approaches the ring. He has long described the ringmaster’s role as one of service. The booming voice and commanding presence may suggest that the person standing in the center is in charge, but Iverson sees the relationship differently. The audience has given him its attention, time, money and imagination. His responsibility is to honor that trust.
Last year, he described a good ringmaster as someone who “leads with an open heart,” remaining open to the audience he has been asked to serve. That philosophy remains firmly intact.
“Audiences far and wide come to us in the midst of so much political and ideological division,” Iverson said this week. “They come to us with all kinds of burdens, yet once they venture under the legendary big top at Circus Vargas they are guaranteed to never be the same again.”
“I can’t think of a better way to spend my life and make a career than elevating others,” he continued. “Convincing children of all ages that they can fly and dare and dream extraordinary dreams definitely makes all the hard work and toil of circus life very rewarding.”
That sense of purpose helps explain why a man who has already achieved so much remains energized by another opening night in another city.
“The fact that there’s still a place for me to share my talent after nearly three decades is such a blessing,” Iverson said. “Being in the entertainment industry is not for the faint of heart. It takes a Herculean level of perseverance to make a life as an entertainer. I am just grateful that I’ve found my own unique path and measure of success.”
For much of the year, the road is Iverson’s neighborhood. He has previously described himself as being made for traveling, with Circus Vargas spending months moving from one community to another. His wife, Priscilla, a former performer herself, travels with him and works with the show.
Their children, Matthew and Lila, also grew up around circus life and performed during the family’s years with Ringling Bros. That makes circus more than a profession for the Iverson family. It has been part workplace, part community and part home.
Circus Vargas itself operates much the same way. A touring circus cannot function as a collection of individuals concerned only with their own acts. The tent must be erected. Equipment must move. Performances must be prepared. The production must travel. Then everything must come down and begin again in another city.
Iverson told Folsom Times last year that everyone has a function within that ecosystem — and, at Circus Vargas, most have several. It requires cooperation and a recognition that each person’s success is tied to everyone else’s, an idea that echoes his definition of home today: community, sharing and “having a stake in the success of another.”
While Iverson is a familiar face to returning Folsom audiences, the production surrounding him this year is anything but a repeat.
Circus Vargas’ 2026 production is “Masquerade,” a new two-hour family show that the company describes as a journey where mystery meets mastery beneath the big top. Iverson is considerably less restrained in his assessment.
“Without a doubt Circus Vargas Presents ‘Masquerade’ is a blockbuster,” he said. “I’ve never been a part of a production that has received so many rousing standing ovations in my near 30 years in the circus industry.”
For a performer who has spent that long in the business, that’s a considerable endorsement. Music is a major part of this year’s experience for Iverson, who began his career as a vocalist.
“For me the music is quite captivating,” he said. “I have so much fun singing the songs from this year’s show.”
Then there are the visuals.
“With a name like ‘Masquerade’ you can expect to see some gorgeous costumes,” he said.
Iverson points to an international cast that includes Spain’s Camilo Moreno, Colombia’s Meza Highwire troupe, the Faltyny Duo from the Czech Republic, Vanessa of Prague and American performer Miss Graciella, along with numerous other acts and plenty of clowning.
The current Circus Vargas lineup also features aerialists, high-wire performances, unicycle skills, hand balancing, archery, hula hoops, quick-change artistry, juggling and other acts.
For those who attended last year’s Folsom engagement and wonder whether they have already seen Circus Vargas, Iverson has a simple answer: You haven’t seen this Circus Vargas.
“The great thing about the circus is no show is ever the same, even if you so happen to watch the same show multiple times during our engagement, which many patrons tend to do,” he said. “Come for the amazing new music, costumes, bounce house, cotton candy, and of course our cast of extraordinary performers and acts.”
“Masquerade,” he explained, reaches backward as it moves forward.
“Circus Vargas Presents ‘Masquerade’ is a nod to the Victorian Age of the Big Top, which was, like many eras, absolutely legendary.”
It is fitting territory for a ringmaster whose own career has become a bridge between circus eras. Iverson entered the ring when the American three-ring circus was still filling enormous arenas. He stood at center stage during the closing chapter of Ringling Bros.’ historic run. Today, he carries that tradition beneath the more intimate Circus Vargas big top.
The surroundings have changed. The purpose, he believes, has not. It is still about wonder, possibility and making people happy. This week, he gets to do it again in one of his favorite places.
The Big Top now welcomes spectators of all ages through Sept. 21
Circus Vargas opened its Folsom engagement Friday, Sept. 4, and continues through Monday, Sept. 21, beneath the big top at Lakeside Church, at the corner of Oak Avenue Parkway and East Bidwell Street. Multiple performances are scheduled throughout the engagement, with specific dates and showtimes available through Circus Vargas’ official ticketing site.
The approximately two-hour production is family-friendly and animal-free. Tickets currently range from $25 to $90 depending on seating location, with VIP, ringside, arena center, arena front, arena side and back arena options. Children younger than 2 are admitted free when seated on an adult’s lap, and child pricing applies for ages 2 through 10. Senior and military discounts are also available.
Circus Vargas organizers are also warning patrons to be cautious of unauthorized online ticket sellers that have been taking advantage of consumers. Officials say some third-party sellers have offered lower-priced Circus Vargas tickets at greatly inflated prices, while others have sold tickets that are not valid at all. In some cases, inflated online listings can also give potential patrons the false impression that official Circus Vargas ticket prices are much higher than they actually are.
To avoid those problems, Circus Vargas officials urge patrons to purchase tickets only through the official Circus Vargas website or directly at the Circus Vargas box office on site. Tickets purchased through unauthorized third-party sellers may not be valid for admission.
Tickets and complete showtimes are available through Circus Vargas’ official ticket site. The box office is also open on show days from noon to 8 p.m.
For Iverson, however, the Folsom engagement can’t simply be reduced to dates on a tour calendar. After nearly three decades in a business notorious for short careers and constant change, he remains grateful there is still a spotlight waiting for him when he walks through the curtain.
After years of performing in some of the world’s most recognizable venues, he remains equally grateful when that spotlight happens to be in Folsom — the city he once described as having “big city with southern hospitality,” where audiences are loud, houses are packed and people aren’t shy about showing their appreciation.
This year, Iverson will again step beneath the lights, fill the tent with that unmistakable voice and invite another Folsom audience into his world. For a man who says home is found wherever there is community, purpose, sharing and a stake in one another’s success, perhaps it isn’t surprising that Folsom has come to feel a little like home.
And as Iverson puts it, after another year and another journey across America: “Folsom hasn’t failed me yet and I doubt it ever will.”
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