Johnathan Lee Iverson is the luckiest man in show business. For 48 weeks a year, he is in a different U.S. city in front of bright spotlights, wearing a radiant smile underneath a top hat, entertaining alongside a diverse cast in lively costumes and doing what he loves most – singing. “I’m a fierce advocate…
I have no idea when, where or how it began. If it’s not the ridiculous clown sightings, it’s the mayhem of political campaigns, their candidates and the media who are leading one and all to deem the melee a circus. I don’t know what’s worse, the predictable circus jabs during the heated political debates that…
“To be the voice of The Greatest Show On Earth® is a huge honor,” explains current Ringmaster David Shipman of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® Presents Circus XTREME. “It is an incredibly fun position. It is my job to make sure that the audience has a fantastic experience from the moment they sit down…
P.T. Barnum once said, “The noblest art is that of making others happy.” Ringmaster Johnathan Lee Iverson takes that quote to heart. A classically trained singer, he understands what so many successful artists and entrepreneurs discover, often later in life: that true success comes when the emphasis is on giving, making others happy, rather than…
Three years after I married my wonderful wife, our beloved son was born. He had me at the sonogram. He was merely a centimeter when we first saw him, but he was the most precious centimeter I’d ever laid eyes on. When he was born I became certain of two things: first, I never wanted…
“For me, founding Big Apple Circus was an act of love,” says the legendary Paul Binder. For founders Michael Christensen and Paul Binder, that love began as jugglers on the streets of Europe. Their talents would take them from London to Istanbul, eventually landing them in the Nouveau Cirque de Paris. “Being in the circus…
On Friday, thanks to our partners Feld Entertainment, Phase 3 Marketing and Chick-fil-A, Johnathan Lee Iverson, the first African-American Ringmaster in 129 years and 15 year Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Baileys Ringmaster, came to the Usher’s New Look office to speak to our Atlanta high school Leadership Academy students about how to follow their…
We know change is the only constant in life, and yet we are always rattled to some degree when it arrives. Ease and familiarity is what we crave most, yet ease and familiarity defies what it is to be alive. It is therefore an unrealistic hope so many of us are guilty of clinging to….
“I never wanted fame; I just wanted to be valuable,” says Peggy Williams. Such a sentiment sounds terribly out of sorts in the age of selfies and YouTube stardom, where fame is the sole aspiration. For Peggy Williams, such a sentiment isn’t hyperbole, it’s simply the truth. Peggy’s journey to The Greatest Show On Earth…
