Editor’s note: This page was updated on June 22, 2023, to correct the year in which the Crest Theatre opened.

The UCLA Center for the Art of Performance’s 2023–24 season will bring 35 events — including music, dance, theater, literary arts and multidisciplinary collaborations — to the new UCLA Nimoy Theater, a landmark venue in Westwood Village that has been renovated and transformed into a 300-seat off-campus performing arts space. 

Named for the late artist, actor, director and philanthropist Leonard Nimoy, the theater is a reimagining of the historic Crest Theatre; the structure was built in 1940 and acquired by UCLA in 2018. The venue, operated and managed by CAP UCLA, will offer audiences an intimate and engaging experience of live performance while providing artists from Los Angeles and around the world new opportunities to develop and showcase their work. The upcoming season features a broad spectrum of voices, viewpoints, ideas and creative expressions across a variety of performing arts mediums.

“CAP UCLA plays a leading role in the cultural landscape of Los Angeles, and the arrival of the Nimoy will make the arts at UCLA even more integral to the city’s vibrant culture of creative expression,” said Edgar Miramontes, CAP UCLA’s newly appointed executive and artistic director. “To begin my tenure at such an exciting time for the arts at UCLA is a great honor, and I look forward to celebrating the opening of the Nimoy with our audiences and all of the artists performing as part of this historic inaugural season.” 

Grammy Award winner and poet J. Ivy will officially open the Nimoy with a performance on Sept. 24. Among the season’s other highlights are Ethiopian music and dance ensemble Ethiocolor (Sept. 29), a unique collaboration by choreographer-dancer Caleb Teicher and pianist-composer Conrad Tao (Sept. 30), renowned Chinese pipa player Wu Man (Oct. 15), rapper Omar Offendum’s show “Little Syria,” an homage to a bygone New York City neighborhood (Nov. 3–4), cabaret performer Meow Meow (March 8), the all-woman Latin alternative band LADAMA (May 5), Emmy Award–winning puppeteer Ronnie Burkett (May 9–12) and a series of original works by acclaimed playwright Daniel Alexander Jones (May 16–19).

Other CAP UCLA 2023–24 performances will take place at Royce Hall on campus and at downtown Los Angeles’ Theatre at Ace Hotel.

Read the announcement and view the full CAP UCLA schedule.