Arizona Theatre Company Presents “Master Harold … and the Boys” in Phoenix on February 13-March 1

Arizona Theatre Company (Sean Daniels, Artistic Director; Billy Russo, Managing Director) presents Athol Fugard’s powerfully haunting masterpiece, “Master Harold … and the Boys” from Feb. 13 to March 1 at the Herberger Theater Center in Phoenix.

Described by The New York Times as a “blistering fusion of the personal and the political,” “Master Harold” … and the Boys is a semi-autobiographical masterwork set in apartheid South Africa in 1950 that explores the relationship between a young white man, Hally (Oliver Prose), and his two middle-aged servants. Sam (Ian Eaton) and Willie (Odera Adimorah).

In a small South African tea shop in 1950, two black men and a white boy joke and dance together, defying the brutalities of apartheid through a personal connection built through joy. But festering issues of family, race, and power are not so easy to ignore, and a single phone call can trigger catastrophe.

One of the great plays of our time, twice on Broadway, winner of the Drama Desk and London Evening Standard Awards for Best Play, Master Harold … and the Boys reveals the profound personal consequences of oppression. Still timely, still compelling, still profoundly moving.

”Athol Fugard asks us the great question of our time. If there are places in your life where you have been given an advantage – what do you do with that info? Yes, it’s a play about South Africa, but it’s also about now, and our families and the daily choices we make. It’s why this is one of the great plays of our generation,” said ATC Artistic Director Sean Daniels.

Directed by Kent Gash, who has directed two previous shows for ATC, Master Harold … and the Boys was first produced at the Yale Repertory Theatre in March 1982 and opened on Broadway on May 4 the same year, where it ran for 344 performances.

Initially banned from production in South Africa and the first of Fugard’s plays to premiere outside of his home country, “Master Harold” … and the Boys “has long seemed one of Fugard’s most astute plays, its climax a ferocious dramatization of the dehumanizing evils at the heart of Apartheid,” wrote The Washington Post.

For more information, go to www.arizonatheatre.org or call the box office in Phoenix at (602) 256-6995.

Event subject to change without notice.