A tiny L.A. theater turns into a scene

Five minutes before showtime, the lead actor of “The Story of Johnny Lightning” — billed as a fusion of stage play, musical and rock documentary — was standing in quiet panic at the end of a long line.

- BY EMMA MADDEN

ETIENNE LAURENT For The Times COMEDIAN Dante Capone performs in "The Story of Johnny Lightning" at New Theater Hollywood.

The problem wasn't nerves; it was the bathroom. New Theater Hollywood, a 49-seat black box on a corner of Santa Monica Boulevard, has just one, tucked behind the stage curtain. To reach it, audience members must cross the stage itself, brushing past the set before the play begins. “I highly recommend not going to the bathroom during the performance,” co-founder Calla Henkel warned the crowd, half in jest. But when the line grew long, the performers peeked out in horror, and the audience kindly let them cut to the front. It was, in miniature, the theater’s whole ethos: a porous boundary between art and life.

In a city where the so-called Theater Row has more “For Lease” signs than marquees, New Theater Hollywood feels improbable. Yet since opening in early 2024, it has already become something of a small cult phenomenon. Co-founded by artists Henkel and Max Pitegoff, the theater hosts an ever-mutable lineup of plays — with titles like “The Mommy Leaks the Floor" and "A Hole Is a Hole" -featuring everyone from firsttime performers to Kaia Gerber. Every production, which typically ranges from $25 to $35, has sold out. The theater's merch, screenprinted by hand in the founders' backyard onto Hollywood Boulevard tourist T-shirts, circulates like insider currency: Addison Rae's creative team, local stylists and art-scene fixtures have all been photographed in it.