Ensemble Theatre Co. Announces Upcoming Season

‘Legends and Legacies’ Is the Theme for Santa Barbara’s Professional Theater in the Heart of the Arts Districts

Hershey Felder stars in “George Gershwin Alone’ which is part of ETC’s upcoming season | Photo: Courtesy Hershey Felder Presents

Stories of some of the most iconic figures in our cultural imagination will take center stage in Ensemble Theatre Company’s (ETC) 2024-25 season, which was announced this week. Themed around “Legends and Legacies,” ETC Executive Director Scott DeVine said he was inspired by this notion, and “I found myself contemplating the hallmarks that make a legend or legendary tale.”

He continued, “Certainly, some legendary tales involve such profound imagination that you wonder how someone came up with the idea. But it’s the individual legends that stood out to me, as many of them never realized the impact they would have on the world in their own lifetimes. My hope for this season is that audiences will experience these stories and consider the mark they will leave on their own families, community, and world.”

The season opens with Dracula: A Comedy of Terrors, a recent Off-Broadway comedy hit. As their logline says, “Ever wondered what would happen if you took Bram Stoker’s legendary vampire tale and put it into a blender with the comedic influences of Mel Brooks, and Monty Python?” We’ll find out October 10-17.

Next up is the Tony Award–nominated musical Million Dollar Quartet, the story behind a real-life 1956 jam session with Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Carl Perkins (Dec. 5-22).

That will be followed by a modern reinterpretation of Hamlet described as: “Young Hamlet returns home from university to find his father dead, his inheritance stolen, and his mother remarried to his uncle. When the ghost of his father returns from the grave and pressures his son into a mission of revenge, Hamlet jump-starts a chain of events that will redefine his relationship to his parents, his mortality, his nation, and himself” (Feb. 6-23).

Then Hershey Felder stars as one of America’s great composers in George Gershwin Alone, a show that incorporates the composer’s best-known songs from “The Man I Love” and “Someone to Watch Over Me,” through the hits of An American in Paris and Porgy and Bess, to a performance of “Rhapsody in Blue” (Apr. 3-20).

The season concludes with the Southern California premiere of Justice, exploring the lives of the first women on the U.S. Supreme Court — Sandra Day O’Connor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Sonia Sotomayor —as they inspire, challenge and usher in the next generation of trailblazers while fighting private battles of their own (Jun. 5-22).
Subscription renewals go on sale on April 10, and new subscriptions will go on sale May 15. Five-play season ticket prices range from $190 to $435. Call (805) 965-5400 or see etcsb.org.