Kristen Stewart just made the most punk rock move of her career by rescuing a 100-year-old piece of Los Angeles history from the brink of extinction. By snatching up the shuttered Highland Theatre in Highland Park, she is officially trading her indie darling status for a new role as a neighborhood cinema mogul. This isn’t just about popcorn and red carpets; it is a middle finger to the corporate machine that has been slowly suffocating local movie culture for years.
A Race To Save The Soul Of Highland Park
When the Highland Theatre turned off its marquee lights in early 2024, it felt like the end of an era for the Figueroa Street corridor. The Moorish-style landmark had survived nearly a century of changes, even outlasting a stint as an adult film house in the seventies, only to be taken down by the brutal post-pandemic marketplace. Stewart told Architectural Digest that she did not even realize she was looking for a theater until this specific opportunity crossed her desk.
Once it did, she described the feeling as a gunshot going off, sparking a literal race to save the building before it could be gutted or turned into another sterile retail space.
For Stewart, the attraction was immediate and visceral because she is fascinated by the secrets these decaying palaces keep. She grew up in the San Fernando Valley with parents who spent their lives working in the film business, so she understands the industry from the inside out. Buying the Highland Theatre is her way of preserving the “unified dissonance” of her hometown, a city she clearly loves with a ferocity that matches her screen presence. She wants to peel back the layers of paint to find the beautiful details that have been buried under decades of wear and tear.
Creating An Antidote To Corporate Bullshit
The most refreshing part of this takeover is Stewart’s blunt refusal to play the typical Hollywood game. She is not interested in building a velvet rope clubhouse for her famous friends or catering to what she calls pretentious Hollywood cinephiles. Instead, she is pitching the Highland Theatre as a family affair for the actual people who live in Highland Park.
Her vision involves a space where neighbors can gather to scheme and dream together, moving movie culture away from a purely transactional model of buying and selling.
She is also using this platform to call out the narrow path that Hollywood has forged over the last decade. Stewart argues that the industry cannot keep making the same movie over and over again while turning its back on the communities that need art the most. Her plan for the theater is to broaden that path through radical new ideas rather than tokenized diversity. By taking movie exhibition back into her own hands, she is effectively creating a new school for how films should be experienced, far away from the corporate mandates of the major theater chains.
The New Guardians Of The Silver Screen
Stewart is now part of a growing movement of directors and actors who are tired of watching their favorite local haunts disappear. She joins Quentin Tarantino, who has successfully turned the New Beverly Cinema and the Vista Theatre into bastions for 35mm film lovers. There is also the massive coalition led by Jason Reitman that recently stepped in to save the Village Theatre in Westwood.
That group includes heavy hitters like Steven Spielberg, Christopher Nolan, and Ryan Coogler, all of whom are trying to ensure that the theatrical experience survives the age of streaming.
What sets Stewart apart is her focus on the “broken down” and the “mysterious” elements of the neighborhood experience. While other stars might focus on high-tech upgrades, she seems more interested in the political act of wielding her voice to protect a space for the community. She is betting on the fact that there is a huge craving for what an independent, community-driven space can offer. If her plan works, the Highland Theatre will not just be a place to watch a movie; it will be a hub for a neighborhood that has been starving for a cultural center of its own.
The Big Close
At the end of the day, Kristen Stewart’s investment is about more than just architecture or nostalgia. It is a reminder that cinema was always meant to be a collective experience, a way for strangers to sit in the dark and feel something together. By rescuing a 1925 movie house from the “corporate bullshit” she so clearly despises, she is proving that the future of film might actually lie in its past. In a world where everything feels increasingly disposable and digital, there is something incredibly hopeful about an actress running toward a crumbling theater with everything she has.
