Tarantino loves Los Angeles, so many of his films are shot on location in real – and
reimagined/idealized locations – so it’s special to see “Tarantino Live,” the spirited homage to him, in the city (and idealized “place”) he loves.
Travelers to Hollywood seek the “Tinsel Town” they have imagined. But the reality of Hollywood Boulevard can be startling to those who stroll the Walk of Fame and find the sidewalks a bit grittier than they dreamed.
Buskers, religious demonstrators, hucksters hawking “homes of the stars tours,” pop-culture museums and shops selling hooded sweatshirts and souvenirs create a carnival atmosphere.
On one side of the street, Jimmy Kimmel tapes his late-night show, and on the other, the iconic Chinese Theater sits next to the site of the annual Academy Awards, which is adjacent to an outdoor mall attached to a Loews Hotel.
Plenty of carnival barkers beckoning “step right up!” figuratively and literally.
Change the Channel for Another Hollywood Experience
The CineVita is not a carnival, but it is in a tent. Technically, it’s a spiegeltent (Dutch for “mirror tent,” which is a large, traveling theater built of wood and canvas decorated with stained glass and mirrors.
Originally built in Belgium up to the 20th century, only a handful remain in existence, and Los Angeles has the largest in the world.
At 15,000 square feet, CineVita Magic is fancifully adorned with 3,000 mirrors, stained glass, and a fourth-generation artisan hand-carved wood.
CineVita presents interactive Hollywood shows, offering up-close, in-the-round experiences. While CineVita’s spiegeltent is not in old Hollywood, it is about six miles away, near LAX, on the location of what was once the Hollywood Park horse race track.
The site has become a campus of entertainment venues such as the historic Forum (former home of the NBA’s Lakers); the NBA’s LA Clippers play blocks away at the new Intuit Dome; the NFL’s Sofi Stadium (which has already hosted a Super Bowl); and Cosm, an advanced, high-tech, immersive domed sports bar.
A Red Carpet Welcome
CineVita is the most intimate and charismatic of its neighboring entertainment venues. In true Hollywood tradition, every guest walks up the red carpet and under a blazing marquis into essentially a period-piece nightclub with food and drink.
Guests are welcomed by fanciful, velvet red-coated, bow-tied ushers who understand they are part of the show. CineVita is the “Hollywood experience” visitors to the area hoped for, both on-stage and throughout the audience, even up in the surrounding balconies.
The shows are a whirlwind of 14 performers and a six-piece band. The night, executive producer Shane Scheel and operations manager Kristen Boule welcomed me to CineVita.
I was treated to “Tarantino Live,” a multi-sensory presentation during which singing actors performed scenes and songs from the director, Quentin Tarantino’s nine hit movies.
The show opened, appropriately, with the tune “California Dreamin’!”
Virtual Travel
Quentin Tarantino’s movies have been filmed in settings and on location in various destinations that make “appearances” in “Tarantino Live.”
Destinations include “Two Pines Chapel,” a Baptist church in Lancaster, California, that appeared in “Kill Bill.” Also, French “cow country,” referred to by the Nazi villain Hans Landa from “Inglorious Basterds,” who makes an appearance on the CineVita stage and mentions the rural locale and the subsequent theater in Paris.
“Candyland, in the American deep south,” from Django Unchained is depicted on the theater’s staircase, and the mountain-bound Minnie’s Haberdashery, from “The Hateful Eight,” is hinted at.
Tarantino loves Los Angeles, so many of his films are shot on location in real settings and reimagined/idealized locations, so it’s special to see “Tarantino Live,” the spirited homage to him, in the city (and idealized “place”) he loves.
The Cast and the Crowd – Stars on Stage and Off
Husband-and-wife stars Maeva Feitelson and James Byous, who play Tarantino characters “Shoshana,” “Fabienne,” and “Butch,” respectively, heat up the stage in the show’s sexiest scene with authenticity.
Their love story is real: the supremely talented duo met performing the scene in London and were married weeks later.
Feitelson, French, and Iranian performed in London’s West End. Byous has performed across America, at sea, and was the lead in the Netflix series “Westside.”
“James’ monologue as Leonardo DiCaprio’s character in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood is amazing to me,” the enchanting Feitelson said of her dashing husband’s performance.
The entire troupe is an all-star cast of entertainers who have performed on Broadway and off, as well as in network television dramas.
They are versatile and crafty, too: on-stage costume and set changes were enacted in moments of darkness or even in plain sight like magic tricks right before the audience’s eyes. One windy special effect blew my napkins right off the table.
“At first, performing in such an intimate setting takes some getting used to, but now I feed off it,” Lord Kraven, one of CineVita’s performers, told me after a show.
I sat at a stage-side and at one point in the show, Kraven, crouched on the steps next to me, delivered his dramatic dialogue directly into my eyes. Kraven has performed in front of the camera by guest-starring on Emmy-winning television dramas, including “S.W.A.T.,” “The Young & The Restless,” and “ER.”
“But I love opportunities to meet the people for whom I perform.”
Creative Chomping, Cocktails and Champagne
CineVita’s creativity continued into the kitchen’s offerings. “Inglorious Pretzel,” “Gorlami Magariti Pizza,” “Royale with Cheese,” and “Reservoir Dogs,” to name a few.
Tarantino fans grinned at the culinary movie references, as they would for crafty cocktails such as “Once Upon a Lime in Mexico” and “The Hateful Buck.”
Prices are surprisingly reasonable for Los Angeles.
Coming Soon…
Other entertainment experiences (because it’s an injustice to just call them “shows,”)
presented by CineVita are “Joey McIntyre’s In Glorious Tinselcolor – Holiday Soundtracks Live.” (The spiegeltent is already festive without holiday decorations, so I can only imagine how stunning it will be.)
“Tarantino Live” might be extended in 2026, but also coming soon are possible performances of scenes and soundtracks of directors Martin Scorsese, Robert Zemeckis, and the Coen Brothers, and Baz Luhrmann. Can you imagine a night full of 007 James Bond’s famed soundtrack songs by Paul McCartney, Madonna, Shirley Bassey, Tina Turner, and Billie Eilish?
Who wouldn’t want to see dancing and singing versions of Ian Fleming’s “Bond girls” and villains such as Pussy Galore, Honey Ryder, Kissy Suzuki, Blofeld, Jaws, and Goldfinger? “Nobody Does it Better” than CineVita! And only in Hollywood!
Read more of Michael Patrick’s work at The Travel Tattler and contact him at
MShiels@aol.com Order his book Travel Tattler – Less Than Torrid Tales at
https://amzn.to/3Qm9FjN
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