The historic Vision Theatre in Leimert Park will reopen Thursday evening following a nearly $40 million restoration and renovation intended to preserve the venue’s historic architecture while adding modern performing-arts facilities.
Mayor Karen Bass, City Councilwoman Heather Hutt, Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs General Manager Daniel Tarica and community and arts leaders were set to attend a 5 p.m. ribbon-cutting ceremony at the 729-seat venue.
The event will include performances by local artists and arts organizations and a screening of “Hair Love,” the Academy Award-winning animated short film by Matthew A. Cherry, according to the mayor’s office.
The restoration combines preservation of the theater’s historic Art Deco architecture with upgrades to the facility.
The theater opened in 1932 as the Leimert Theatre and was designed in the Art Deco and Spanish Colonial Revival styles, according to EverGreene Architectural Arts, a historic preservation and architectural restoration company that worked on the project.
EverGreene said the building is one of the last two Art Deco theaters in the Los Angeles area. The theater’s auditorium includes a historic ceiling mural by artist Anthony Heinsbergen, according to the company.
The theater operated until 1968 and was acquired by the Jehovah’s Witnesses in the late 1970s, when it was renamed the Watchtower, according to the company.
Actress Marla Gibbs purchased the theater in the early 1990s and renamed it the Vision Theatre, with plans to establish a performing-arts venue.
The city acquired the property in the late 1990s, and an $11 million rehabilitation completed in 2012 returned the front portion of the building to community use.
EverGreene was brought onto the latest restoration project by the city of Los Angeles. Its work included conservation of the auditorium’s ceiling mural, plaster repairs, replication of historic finishes on the auditorium walls and proscenium, cleaning and repair of ceiling grilles and refinishing of auditorium doors.
The city said the reopened Vision Theatre will operate through a partnership between the Department of Cultural Affairs and Where Art Can Occur Theater Center, also known as WACO Theater Center.
The partnership is expected to support community events, commercial productions, theater rentals, arts education and other cultural programming.