The Pearl Previews LA’s Sizzling Theater Season
The stars have never been brighter for LA theater lovers! Get your tickets now for some of LA’s hottest shows: LA Opera’s Carmen at Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, The Music Man at the Ahmanson Theatre, and the Tony Award-winning musical The Outsiders at Hollywood Pantages. In addition to these blockbuster productions, you’ll find countless smaller performing arts theaters in almost every part of town, such as the El Portal, Odyssey Theatre, Zephyr Theatre, and Garry Marshall Theatre, offering top entertainment in an intimate setting. Take a deeper dive and check out Broadway World Los Angeles for the latest news, reviews, and show coverage from critics and reporters who know the Los Angeles stage scene. Here are some of the season’s highlights, many not far from The Pearl.
Carmen Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 135 N Grand Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90012
Oct 17 – Nov 7 LA Opera presents the premiere of a brand-new production of Bizet’s Carmen, bringing Spanish Gothic style to the stage, created by director/designer Thaddeus Strassberger. Domingo Hindoyan makes his inaugural appearance in his new role as LA Opera Music Director, with one of the world’s most iconic scores. Meet Carmen. She’s desirable, defiant, and driven, and thinks nothing of charming a soldier to escape a spot of trouble—never imagining that he would abandon his childhood sweetheart and desert his post to follow her. But Don José is a jealous lover, and as Carmen begins a new relationship with the bullfighter Escamillo, his passion turns dark—and deadly.
Candide Dorothy Chandler Pavilion 135 N Grand Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90012
Mark your calendar for Nov 21 – Dec 13 for Leonard Bernstein’s Tony and Olivier Award-winning classic Candide, starring Broadway icon Patti LuPone, featuring lavish costumes and rapidly-changing sets bursting with 18th-century Rococo style. Can’t get enough of LA Opera? The Classic 5-Opera Package offers a full season of awe-inspiring productions of your favorite operas: Carmen, Candide, Nabucco, Turandot, and The Marriage of Figaro. Your package gives you up to 15% savings off the already lowest fixed pricing, priority seating selection, pre-sale access to add-on concerts, recitals, and Off-Grand performances, and more.
Meredith Willson’s The Music Man Ahmanson Theatre 135 N Grand Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90012
Oct 28 – Nov 8 There’s trouble in River City when a fast-talking salesman gets his heart stolen by the town librarian. Meredith Willson’s six-time, Tony Award-winning musical comedy The Music Man follows fast-talking traveling salesman Harold Hill as he cons the people of River City, Iowa into buying instruments and uniforms for a boys’ band that he vows to organize—despite the fact that he doesn’t know a trombone from a treble clef. His plans to skip town with the cash are foiled when he falls for Marian the librarian, who transforms him into a respectable citizen by curtain’s fall.
Destiny of Desire Mark Taper Forum 135 N Grand Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90012
Nov 11 – Dec 25 Destiny of Desire is a delightfully unapologetic musical homage to telenovelas. On a stormy night in Bellarica, Mexico, two baby girls are born—one into outlandish wealth, and one into a life of poverty. When the newborns are swapped by a ruthless ex-beauty queen, the stage is set for two outrageous misfortunes to grow into an extraordinary destiny. Brimming with energy, Karen Zacarías’ hilarious hit, Destiny of Desire, takes you on an emotional rollercoaster sprinkled with the melodrama and wild antics that make the telenovela the most popular form of storytelling in the world.
The Outsiders Hollywood Pantages Theatre 6233 Hollywood Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90028
Sep 30 – Oct 18 The story that defined a generation, The Outsiders is the winner of four 2024 Tony Awards®, including Best Musical. Adapted from S.E. Hinton’s seminal novel and Francis Ford Coppola’s iconic film, this thrilling new musical features a book by Adam Rapp with Justin Levine, and music and lyrics by Jamestown Revival. Set in 1967 Tulsa, Oklahoma, Ponyboy Curtis, his best friend Johnny Cade, and their Greaser family of ‘outsiders’ battle with their affluent rivals, the Socs. The Outsiders navigates the complexities of self-discovery as the Greasers dream about who they want to become in a world that may never accept them. With a dynamic original score, The Outsiders is a story of friendship, family, belonging, and the realization that there is still “lots of good in the world.”
Frankenstein: Resurrection The Nocturne Theater 324 North Orange Street, Glendale, CA 91203
Closes Sep 30 Victor Frankenstein awakens in a secret laboratory beneath the infamous Paris Morgue, resurrected by the brilliant and obsessive Doctor Seraphina Pretorius. As Victor becomes convinced that the doctor’s sister Elsa is the reincarnation of his lost bride Elizabeth, he descends into a nightmare of obsession, murder, and madness. Guided by the Monster through the proverbial Nine Circles of Hell, Victor must confront the terrible truth that the greatest monster he ever created was himself. Operatic, brutal, and deeply human, Frankenstein: Resurrection asks one haunting question: what is the cost of refusing to let go—and who pays it when we don’t?. Music and orchestration by Chris Thomas. Books and lyrics by Justin Meyer.
August Wilson’s Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom A Noise Within 3352 E Foothill Blvd. Pasadena, CA 91107
Closes Sep 20 Set in a Chicago recording studio in 1927, August Wilson’s Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom unfolds with tension, music, and truth. As legendary blues singer Ma Rainey arrives to record, underlying conflicts rise among her band, exposing deep wounds, ambition, and the realities of race in America. With sharp dialogue and unforgettable characters, Wilson crafts a powerful, intimate portrait of artistry, identity, and control. Both electric and deeply human, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom is a gripping exploration of faith, joy, and the cost of being heard. Directed by Gregg T. Daniel.
The Visit Pasadena Playhouse 39 S El Molino Ave. Pasadena, CA 91101
Closes Oct 4 When the richest woman in the world returns to her struggling hometown, she’s ready and willing to rescue it from ruin… on one condition. In this haunting, twisted, and truly grotesque comedy, an entire community is forced to confront an unthinkable question: how far are you willing to go for a billion dollars? Following the triumphant run of Amadeus, Tony Award winners Jefferson Mays and Darko Tresnjak return to the Playhouse for another gripping and truly unmissable theatrical event.
Purpose Geffen Playhouse 10886 Le Conte Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90024
Nov 11 – Dec 13 Direct from Broadway, this 2025 Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning play makes its LA debut with the original Broadway cast, directed by the incomparable Phylicia Rashad. Both intimate and epic, Purpose is provocative, often hilarious, and ultimately a devastating exploration of legacy and the cost of believing in something bigger than yourself. Meet the Jaspers: generations of a powerful Black political family under one roof where nothing stays buried for long. When their youngest son returns home, instincts kick in to protect their public image of leadership and moral authority, and fractures soon appear as private grievances, betrayals, and long-simmering questions of identity rise to the surface.
Photo Credits:
Photo #1: Center Theatre Group
Photo #2: LA Opera
Photo #3: LA Opera
Photo #4: Center Theatre Group
Photo #5: Center Theatre Group
Photo #6: Hollywood Pantages Theatre
Photo #7: The Nocturne Theater
Photo #8: A Noise Within
Photo #9: Pasadena Playhouse
Photo #10: Geffen Playhouse