Rick Caruso’s Pacific Palisades open-air mall, Palisades Village, reopened this summer, but until now, the complex’s movie theater had remained closed. On Tuesday, Caruso and Paramount Pictures announced a long-term agreement to reopen it. Terms of the lease agreement were not disclosed. 

The theater will be operated by The Lot, a high-end, dine-in cinema brand, according to a release from Caruso and Skydance-owned Paramount Pictures. The Lot operates four locations, including in La Jolla and at Newport Beach’s Fashion Island retail center. 

The Bay Theater will show first-run films as well as classics and host curated events. It will provide moviegoers with in-theater dining, including a full bar. 

“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 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,” Ellison said. 

The Bay has been closed since January 2025’s Palisades Fire. It will reopen later this year, Caruso told the Los Angeles Times.

Prior to the fire, the theater had been leased to Netflix, which stepped up to operate it in October 2021. The streaming media company used the theater to host special events, screen classic films and showcase its own original theatrical movies. The Bay had opened in 2018 as a location of the chain Cinépolis.  

The Bay is not the only shuttered LA-area theater being revived. Over the summer, Alamo Drafthouse owner Sony Pictures Entertainment announced a deal to lease and reopen both the Cinerama Dome and ArcLight Hollywood. 

Movie theaters have benefited from higher box office revenues this year, thanks to some big hits like The Odyssey and Spider-Man: Brand New Day, though revenues are still down and there are fewer theaters to screen new films.

Many industry watchers are concerned that media consolidation like the recent megamerger between Paramount and Warner Bros. will lead to fewer films being made, as they have in the past, though that deal specifically calls for a quota for theatrical releases for the new company’s first five years.