Theater is alive but struggling in Los Angeles. With exciting new shows opening all over town, support local artists and theaters: Pick one and plan an expedition.
Now Playing
Fatherland at the Fountain in Hollywood
Historical Records at the Michelle Danner Acting Studio in Culver City
Cinderella at Theatre West in the Cahuenga Pass
Upcoming Openings
March 7
The Actor’s Gang, Culver City
Ybor City, set in 1931, tells the story of overworked Cuban cigar factory immigrants who find themselves inspired by the spirit world toward revolution. A fully bilingual new play with supertitles in both languages and a mostly Latinx cast from Cuba, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Chile, Argentina, Brazil, and the US.
March 8
Victory Theatre, Burbank
Faithless is a dramatic comedy exploring a family facing deeply intense life questions and starting a journey toward possible reconciliation.
March 8
Hudson Guild Theatre, Hollywood
Anthony Manchester has great plans for his new family: climb the corporate ladder, work hard, and provide a great lifestyle. With his wife Grace (a church girl) kept barefoot pregnant, and taking care of the home, life is perfect!
Grace has dreams of her own, With the support of her church minister’s husband, she will enroll in graduate school, get a part-time job, and enjoy being a newlywed…or will she?
March 9
Open Fist Theatre Co., Atwater Village
Middle School hell for seventh-grader Bumpy Diggs, a scrappy little weirdo in the 1980s whose “friends” tease her relentlessly, whose father is an ogre, who desperately wants her mother to run away with their priest, and whose stupid science project is due. A world premiere, written by Becky Wahlstrom.
March 9
Pacific Resident Theatre, Venice
Wolf Mankowitz has reset Nicolai Gogol’s famous short story “The Overcoat” into the Jewish East End of London. This reimagined portrait of an aging clerk who can’t afford a new overcoat is a tale of love and resilience told with dignity and humor.
Pacific Resident Theatre has teamed up with the nonprofit One Warm Coat to collect clean, gently worn or new coats during the run. Donated coats are welcome at the theater at showtime to support your LA neighbors in need and receive free coffee and a treat when you attend. Coats will be sent to Venice Community Housing.
March 13
Pasadena Playhouse
When the “perfect” Latina daughter brings her boyfriend home to meet the parents, her family’s biases and preconceptions are put on full display. All must navigate the ins and outs of family dynamics and the boundaries of acceptance while tackling the age-old question: what does it truly mean to be an American?
March 21
Iambic Lab 2024: Hamlet, Undiscovered Country
Independent Shakespeare Co., Atwater Village
From the troupe that brings you LA’s Shakespeare in the Park is the seventh edition of their annual festival celebrating theater. iambic lab, opens March 21, with a mix of ticketed and free events. With this year’s offerings, ISC explores different facets of Shakespeare’s Hamlet.
ISC artistic director Melissa Chalsma describes one of the festival’s works, “Hamlet, Solus, an experimental production, will spawn new insights into the text, alongside new performance techniques we can integrate into our work at large.”
March 27
Geffen Playhouse
Less than a year after its Broadway premiere, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Fat Ham hits the Geffen. Meet Juicy, a young, queer Black man with a Shakespearean-sized dilemma. When the ghost of his dead father shows up at his family’s BBQ wedding reception demanding his murder be avenged, does the poetic and sensitive Juicy have it in him to do the deed, or will he “to thine own self be true?”
March 28
Theatre 40, Beverly Hills
Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla are rivals in a contest to see who will determine the future of electric power in America in a struggle which spans decades.
March 31
August Wilson’s King Hedley II
A Noise Within, Pasadena
After seven years in prison, King Hedley re-enters society eager to rebuild his life but quickly confronts the inescapable challenges facing Black men in Reagan-era Pittsburgh. A Noise Within continues its commitment to August Wilson’s “American Century Cycle” with a new production of King Hedley II. Gregg T. Daniel returns to direct the ninth play in Wilson’s 10-play cycle exploring the Black experience in 20th-century America.
March 31 (one performance only)
Studio/Stage, Hollywood
A new production of a Hollywood Fringe Festival hit from last summer. Young women with MADD (Male Attention Deficiency Disorder) spend every waking moment waiting for a text back. M.A.D.D. About the Boy, a solo show by Roni Gayer, imagines this helpless, miserable state as an actual clinical condition. The play takes place at a renowned mental institution called The Self Love Village.
April 2
Ahmanson Theatre, downtown
Featuring one of the most iconic scores of all time by Jule Styne and Bob Merrill and an updated book from Harvey Fierstein, the second-time-around Broadway hit Funny Girl brings its song and dance, drama, and comedy to the Ahmanson.
April 4
East West Players, Little Tokyo district downtown
A world premiere by Lisa Sanaye Dring, whose Hungry Ghost was at the Skylight last year, Kairos was developed as Part of the Geffen Playhouse Writers’ Room. Both a dystopian science-fiction play and a dark-comedy love story, Kairos is the story of two people falling in love during a tectonic shift in society. Their relationship is tested by the advent of Prometheus, a procedure that grants immortality to a select few.
April 4
Santa Monica Playhouse
Cleveland native Nick James spends his formative years in Santa Monica. Ignoring his stepfather’s warnings against falling in with “unsavory fellows,” James pursues a glamorous career in Hollywood, befriending plenty of the wrong crowd. He becomes an actor, model, filmmaker and gigolo; inclinations towards brawling and substance abuse derail his progress. Will the Unsavory Fellow finally realize his dreams, or will his tendency towards self-sabotage bring his world crashing down?
April 5
The Odyssey, West Side
A return engagement of this enjoyable show, reviewed by the Buzz in its first run.
April 6
Wilshire-Ebell Theatre, Hancock Park
Alice in Wonderland, a new musical experience created by the female team of Brooke deRosa and Paige Lehnert, closely follows the original book by Lewis Carroll and features a colorful cast of 18, stunning LED backdrops, all-new musical numbers, original costumes and interactive elements.
April 6
Monsters of the American Cinema
Rogue Machine, Melrose Ave
When his husband dies, Remy Washington, a Black man, finds himself the owner of a drive-in movie theater and a caregiver to his late husband’s straight, white teenage son, Pup. United by their love of classic American monster movies, the two have developed a warm and caring familial chemistry, but their relationship fractures when Remy discovers that Pup and his friends have been bullying a gay teen at his school. Told through dueting monologue and playful dialogue, this haunting and humorous tale is about fathers and sons, ghosts and monsters, discovery and resilience while being transported to worlds beyond through the American cinema.
April 13
The Odyssey, West Side
Can artistic expression be forced to conform to political ideology? In this darkly funny satire, Pownall imagines a chilling encounter between Prokofiev and Shostakovich, subjected to the bullying of Stalin and Zhdanov, who accuse the composers of anti-democratic, “formalist” musical tendencies that are alien to the Soviet people and their artistic tastes. “Music that could make a whole population sick!” Post-war Soviet society may be the backdrop for Stalin’s Master Class, but the themes raised about the relationship between art and politics remain universally relevant.
April 19
Celebration Theatre at the Los Angeles LGBT Center, Hollywood
Songs for a New World chronicles life in a modern age where dreams and disillusionment go hand-in-hand in the search for authentic connection, discerning what’s real in a virtual world of social media platforms and dating websites, and celebrating life as we make it.
April 18
The Odyssey, West Side
Luther, a man from Cork named in honor of his Granny’s hero, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., only leaves his apartment for essential journeys — and to perform as an Elvis impersonator. Luther struggles to live life to the fullest in this deeply moving exploration of prejudice, privilege and resilience.
April 25
Geffen Playhouse, Westwood
This world premiere is written and performed by Helder Guimarães, who created two fascinating virtual shows for the Geffen “Stayhouse” during lock down, The Present and Inside the Box. As a Portuguese immigrant, storyteller, and sleight-of-hand magician, Helder Guimarães arrived in America at age 29. Wide-eyed and full of ideas, he discovers a fascinating puzzle of cultural and professional challenges to solve while he tries to build a home. The Hope Theory offers a unique perspective on America through the eyes of an optimistic outsider.
May 4
A full spring season of three shows
Latino Theater Company, downtown
The Latino Theater Company’s 2024 Spring Season features two world premieres and a sure-fire crowd-pleaser, running concurrently throughout May. Ghost Waltz presents Mexican composer Juventino Rosas, an Indigenous musician whose life story has gone untold and whose works have been attributed to Europeans. Following Rosas from his father’s early death to his friendship with ragtime genius Scott Joplin, Mayer mixes music, magic, drama, passion, spirituality, and dance in a celebration that explores the lives of people of color during the emerging Americas of the late 19th century and their ghostlike impact on our own lives today.
American Mariachi opens on May 11. Jose Luis Valenzuela directs this big-hearted, feel-good comedy with live music about familia, amor, and tradición. It’s the 1970s and women can’t be mariachis…or can they? Lucha spends her days caring for her mother and yearning for more. Defying expectations, Lucha and her spunky cousin hunt for bandmates and take up instruments.
On May 13, LATC joins forces with Playwrights’ Arena to present the world premiere of Mix-Mix: The Filipino Adventures of a German Jewish Boy by Boni B. Alvarez, the coming-of-age tale of 13-year-old Rudy Preissman, who escapes Nazi Germany at the age of nine with his family to find safety in the Philippines. Their tropical refuge is upended when Japan invades the islands, forcing the family and their Filipino friends to hide in the heights and depths of sacred Mount Banahao.
June 5
Ahmanson Theater, downtown
Meet Usher: a Black, queer writer writing a musical about a Black, queer writer writing a musical about a Black, queer writer. Winner of the Tony Award for Best Musical, Michael R. Jackson’s Pulitzer Prize–winning work exposes the heart and soul of a young artist grappling with desires, identity, and instincts he both loves and loathes.
