The Bay Theater, a Southern California venue in the Pacific Palisades that has been closed since January 2025 when wildfires greatly damaged the community, is set to be restored and reopen soon, thanks to assistance from Paramount Pictures and Los Angeles developer Rick Caruso.

Paramount and Caruso on Tuesday announced a long-term agreement for the Bay Theater in Palisades Village. The theater will be operated by The Lot, which is a luxury dine-in cinema chain. The Bay will showcase first-run theatrical releases and other repertory titles, events, and special programming and be equipped with luxury seating, dining, and signature cocktails. The Bay Theater is located at 1035 N. Swarthmore Avenue in Pacific Palisades.

Under Paramount’s stewardship, it’s likely that the venue will be home to premieres and other experiential activations and theatrical events. Plans are currently underway to reopen the theater’s doors, and a grand opening date intended for later this year will be announced in the coming weeks.

“Together with Caruso, we are proud to help bring the Bay back to life as a place for the Pacific Palisades community to gather around the shared experience of cinema,” Skydance Chairman and Co-CEO David Ellison said in a statement. “This theater has always meant more than movies alone — it’s woven into the fabric of this neighborhood, and helping restore it is a privilege. We’re inspired by the resilience of Pacific Palisades residents, and we’re honored to help support this community’s comeback.”

“Paramount is one of the world’s leading entertainment studios, with an extraordinary legacy of cinematic storytelling and, importantly, a deep commitment to the City of Los Angeles and to the future of the theatrical experience,” Caruso said in a statement. “Together, we see an opportunity to bring that to the Bay with the care, design and hospitality we’re known for, so that every visit feels special. The Bay has always been at the heart of the Palisades, and its return is one of the most meaningful signs yet that this community, following the reopening of the Palisades Village this summer, is coming back stronger than ever. David Ellison and I have a shared ambition to make it one of Los Angeles’ premier moviegoing destinations. I am grateful for David’s leadership and commitment to Los Angeles and the entertainment industry.”

Adolfo Fastlicht, Founder and CEO of The Lot, added, “We are incredibly proud to step into this partnership and manage to lead the operations of such a historic and beloved venue. Our goal is to perfectly complement Paramount Pictures’ cinematic vision and Caruso’s beautiful retail destination by delivering a flawless, high-end guest experience. Through our curated offering and dedicated hospitality, we look forward to welcoming the Pacific Palisades community back to the movies, the way they were intended to be shared.”

Paramount isn’t the only studio now salvaging a long-closed venue in Los Angeles, as Sony is helping to reopen the Cinerama Dome in Hollywood under the operation of Alamo Drafthouse.

EXCLUSIVE: Haley Lu Richardson, the actress known for her work in The White Lotus Season 2, Ponies and more, has joined the cast of Universal Pictures‘ Miami Vice ’85.

No word on the role to be played by Richardson. She joins an ensemble led by Michael B. Jordan and Austin Butler as Detectives Ricardo “Rico” Tubbs and James “Sonny” Crockett, respectively.

Based on the crime drama series from Anthony Yerkovich and Universal Television, Miami Vice ’85 draws on the show’s pilot episode, “Brother’s Keeper,” exploring the glamour and corruption of mid-’80s Miami. Further plot details are being kept under wraps. The show revolved around Crockett and Tubbs, two undercover detectives infiltrating South Florida’s criminal underworld.

Filming for Imax, Top Gun: Maverick‘s Joseph Kosinski directing from a script by Nightcrawler‘s Dan Gilroy. Other supporting cast includes Alden Ehrenreich, Whitney Peak, Camila Morrone, John Leguizamo, Danny Ramirez, Walton Goggins, Andrew Schultz, Edi Gathegi, André Holland, and Michael Irby.

Miami Vice ’85 remains in production for release in theaters on May 19, 2028. The film is produced by Dylan Clark/Dylan Clark Productions (The Batman, The Penguin) and Kosinski (F1). Gilroy’s script is based on characters created by Yerkovich from the series executive produced by Yerkovich and Michael Mann. Eric Warren Singer wrote an earlier draft of the screenplay. Executive Vice President of Production Development Sara Scott and Creative Executive of Production Development Christina Hoffrogge are overseeing the project for Universal.

Richardson has most recently been seen leading Peacock’s Cold War thriller series Ponies opposite Game of Thrones alum Emilia Clarke. Her recent film credits include Gore Verbinski’s Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die and the Sundance flick Zi from her frequent collaborator Kogonada (Columbus, After Yang). The actress is repped by Gersh and Sloane, Offer, Weber & Dern.

On top of writing, directing, producing and acting in his new movie The Debut, Jesse Eisenberg took on an additional unexpected role: songwriter.

For the film — which follows a shy housewife (played by Julianne Moore) cast in a community theater production who loses herself in the performance — Eisenberg wrote seven of the original songs that comprise the movie’s central show, called Nosy Neighbors; one of those tunes, “This City May Have Chewed Me Up (But It Hasn’t Spit Me Out),” is getting a best original song awards push.

At a screening on the Fox lot on Monday, Eisenberg joined composer Emile Mosseri and moderator Justin Hurwitz to break down his musical process, teasing, “My brain goes to musical theater cliches more than it goes to like sports or women — my wife! One woman, one woman.”

The star emphasized that he is not classically trained but writes music on the piano or while playing guitar, “and again, the thing I can write is musical theater music. It’s not like I also do like what you do [in composing scores]. This is the extent of my talents and I worked really hard on it, but that’s my ceiling.”

Eisenberg recalled working with Mosseri on 2022 film When You Finish Saving the World and writing a song for Finn Wolfhard’s character. “I sent it to Emile and Emile was so sweet, but he was like, ‘This is really good if he was doing musical theater music, and he’s more doing rock music,’” Eisenberg explained. “And so I was like, ‘OK, can you rewrite the music?’” Mosseri did, but Eisenberg said it made him realize “I’m not a good enough musician to then do jazz or something like more complicated…. I really like musical theater music and I like a lot of songs I’ve written. But like that’s the extent of my skillset.”

Mosseri responded by noting how Eisenberg is “very humble and very sort of downplays his musical prowess because he wrote these incredible songs,” as the filmmaker explained that with a story set in the world of the theater, “it gave me permission in a way to make things heightened, because musicals are heightened and silly and absurdist.”

That doesn’t mean he didn’t take the songwriting seriously, though, with Eisenberg explaining, “I wanted to feel like this is a real thing. So I’m making fun of the songs, but when I’m sitting there writing ‘This City May Have Chewed Me Up,’ I’m crying. Like I am feeling the city have chewed me up, Jesse, and it hasn’t spit me out, Jesse. Like it’s very personal, but I knew the context around it is going to feel silly.”

He added that he was particularly inspired by the wave of ’90s musicals that “kind of fetishized New York City,” which he was obsessed with growing up. “All the songs in the movie are like in the spirit of that weird thing, like ‘Finding a good guy in town is like a needle in a haystack,’” Eisenberg joked. “This stuff where like I don’t think any real person who’s self-actualized can relate to that feeling, but they work in the musical theater.”

The Debut hits theaters Dec. 11.