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The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot is an immersive, interactive play directly inspired by the 1966 uprising in the Tenderloin that marked a seminal moment in the ongoing fight for transgender rights.
Audiences experience the riot from the perspective of the “screaming queens” who stood up against police harassment and for the very right to exist. Over breakfast (for dinner), attendees sit shoulder to shoulder with the play’s actors as history unfolds around them. The Compton’s riots, which preceded the Stonewall Inn riot by three years, mark the first militant act of queer resistance against social oppression and police harassment in the U.S The Tenderloin Museum (TLM) is honored to present a new production of The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot as an ongoing production in the heart of the neighborhood that holds the riot’s legacy in its reputation.
Co-written by Collette LeGrande and Donna Personna–two trans women who were part of the scene at the Tenderloin Compton’s–with seasoned playwright and actor Mark Nassar, The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot narrativizes, humanizes, and celebrates a historic act of queer resistance that was nearly lost from the public memory, and the legacy of which is still unfolding. The Tenderloin Museum produced the development and initial production of the play in 2018 to much critical acclaim that sold out an extended run of shows; resilient demand and community support for reviving the Compton’s play culminated in the Tenderloin Museum transforming a once vacant Larkin St. storefront into a retro cafeteria to serve as a set for weekly performances of the play.
Ezra Reaves directs this new production of Compton’s; they/he will bring deep experience as an actor on stage and screen, comedian, and experimental theater writer, director, and performer to actualize this unique show. Reaves is also a co-producer alongside the play’s co-writer Mark Nassar and TLM. A pioneer in immersive theater Nassar was a co-creator of Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding, and Reaves has worked with companies like Punchdrunk (who produced the immersive show Sleep No More) and the Neo-Futurists. Reaves and Nassar have created many immersive shows independently, and they meet working on The Speakeasy, a long-running and immersive theater experience in San Francisco. They both have been instrumental in realizing the site-specific venue, designed to bring Compton’s to life in its literal place of origin: San Francisco’s Tenderloin. Not only will this new production of the play honor perhaps the single most significant overture in Tenderloin history, but it will also create positive activation in the neighborhood that, like in 1966, endures the an inordinate share of the city’s economic and social challenges borne by the city’s most vulnerable and marginalized communities.
History/Significance of the Riot
The event known as the Compton’s Cafeteria riot occurred in August of 1966 when a group of people who we would today call “transgender” stood up against police harassment in a coffee shop on the corner of Turk and Taylor Streets in San Francisco’s Tenderloin. The riot was comparable to better-known Stonewall riots in 1969, but the extreme marginalization of the people who instigated Compton’s meant that its significance went unrecognized for decades, its legacy obscured and pushed underground.
The history of the Compton’s Cafeteria riot was recovered in large part by the work of historian Susan Stryker. Her Emmy Award winning documentary Screaming Queens: The Riot at Compton’s Cafeteria (2005, co-directed with Victor Silverman) brought the riot (and rioters) to the surface, contextualizing and clarifying the riot’s legacy through archival research and oral history interviews. In 2021, Stryker published an in-depth, place-based investigation of the site of the riot called “At the Crossroads of Turk and Taylor: Resisting carceral power in San Francisco’s Tenderloin District,” which illuminated a long view of trans history in the Tenderloin and San Francisco more broadly, as well as the systemic discrimination, inequality, and harassment of trans people both past and present.
Even more recently, Bay Area local news channel ABC7 uncovered archival footage from the summer of the riot that documents a complex social response to discrimination against queer people in the Tenderloin: pickets outside of Compton’s organized by a radical, grassroots, queer youth group called The Vanguard. All of this is to say that the significance of Compton’s is still accumulating. What was once lost to history has formed a bedrock on which to build community and identity. As trans visibility in mainstream society has increased, even since the original production of the play in 2018, so too have challenges to the trans community at large. As such, building up and amplifying stories of trans belonging and resilience are essential, whether through further historicization or through creative response, such as theater.
A reflection of the solidarity displayed at Compton’s, The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot play is a highly collaborative production, inspired by the riot’s prominent feature in the Tenderloin Museum’s historical exhibit. Since its opening in 2015, TLM has highlighted the Compton’s Cafeteria riot in its permanent exhibition, drawing extensively on Stryker’s work to narrativize the riot through the stories of the people who made it happen. The play was conceived and developed by Bay Area playwright Mark Nassar and Tenderloin Museum director Katie Conry. Nassar wrote the script with legendary neighborhood trans women Donna Personna and Collette LeGrande, whose first-hand accounts of Compton’s inform the dialogue and direction.
As a play centering trans-ness, its production transgresses many conventions of theater. By design, the script eschews the typical boundaries of the theater–there is no “fourth wall” to be broken, rather audiences members and performers are intermingled from the moment they walk through the door. Furthermore, the play has been intertwined with the local trans and TL communities since its inception. Throughout 2017, the play was workshopped extensively at the Tenderloin Museum to incorporate community feedback, and the final result is a groundbreaking hybrid of theater and living history.
In 2018, the play found its initial venue at the New Village Cafe, a breakfast and lunch counter in the TL-adjacent historic queer corridor or Polk Street. Nassar, LeGrande, and Personna, along with the Tenderloin Museum as producer, organized an intrepid cast and crew who realized the play to critical acclaim, selling out the debut run and an extension for a total of 32 packed shows. With demand and interest so high, TLM sought to find a home for the play that could be more permanent, a space that could host this hard-hitting tribute to an essential and overlooked piece of queer history, as well as a space and production that could support and cultivate community in the neighborhood that fomented the riot in the first place, the Tenderloin.
A well-developed plan to revive The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot in the TL was foisted by covid related shutdowns and its specific after effects on the Tenderloin. The Tenderloin Museum was set to produce the play in 2020 at the restaurant of the COVA hotel on Ellis St., only to have that space (and the entire hotel) converted to a "shelter in place" hotel serving the city’s unhoused population during the pandemic. The Tenderloin bore an inordinate amount of covid’s economic and social impact on the city, which led to a reconfiguration of the neighborhood’s commercial/retail landscape. A new opportunity emerged: to take over a space on Larkin St. in the historic Heartland Hotel building that has been home to several queer businesses, including the city’s longest-running gay bar, The Gangway.
Importance of new production to TLM & the Tenderloin Neighborhood
As the Tenderloin fights tooth and nail to stabilize its community and economy against post-covid “doom-loop” energy as well as the deadly fentanyl epidemic, The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot play hopes to aid the community effort to (re)invigorate the Tenderloin with a piece of homegrown, grassroots culture. The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot creative team (led by Reaves and Nassar) is hard at work actualizing an expansive vision for the play and building on the magic of the show’s much-feted and completely sold out 2018 premiere run. Work is underway to transform the Larkin St. space into an immersive set reminiscent of a mid-century cafeteria, replete with retro flourishes, plushy pastels, and luminous neon. The production will feature a cast and crew of 15; not only will the play create work and opportunity for primarily LGBTQ+ artists, it will also bring regular and positive activity celebrating the neighborhood's history and community on a block that has been especially impacted since the onset of the pandemic.
In short, this upcoming production of The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot is a major undertaking, a prolific collaboration, and a milestone for the Tenderloin Museum. TLM has nurtured this creative project for nearly its entire existence, and the play is a prime example of how the mission of the museum–to promote the history and character of the long-overlooked and maligned Tenderloin neighborhood–can strengthen community, deepen understanding, and open new, creative ways to empathize with the brave forebears of the modern LGBTQ movement.
The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot is set to open in June 2024. Previews will begin in late April, coinciding with a block-party in Myrtle alley (adjacent to the new venue) celebrating the play, queer resistance, and community in the Tenderloin. The preview block party is in collaboration with the Tenderloin Community Benefit District (TLCBD) and an alliance of neighborhood businesses and organizations as part of a broader effort to shape a prosperous and positive post-pandemic Tenderloin for its working-class residents
Furthermore, the Tenderloin Museum remains committed to making The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot affordable for all through the provision of sliding scale and needs-based ticket options, as well as free tickets to Tenderloin and trans-centric organizations. To muster resources for a “no one turned away for lack of funds” option to experience the play, the museum is hosting a drag queen bingo fundraiser (emcee’d by TL legend of drag Olivia Hart) to raise support for subsidized tickets to the play.
Finally, this spring TLM is hosting Transition Times: Re-Membering Anticarceral Resistance in the Tenderloin, an exhibit and public program series that contextualizes the 1966 Compton’s Cafeteria riot presenting a curated selection from historian Susan Stryker’s archival collection. Transition Times is organized by the Turk x Taylor Initiative, a non-hierarchical grassroots formation with a mission to liberate the landmark building at 101-121 Taylor Street that is the site of the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot and currently owned and operated as a halfway house by the private prison company GEO Group. Turk x Taylor is working to physically and symbolically re-envision the legendary queer and trans site and ultimately create a just future for the historic structure.
There has never been more energy, attention, and involvement with the legacy of the Compton’s Cafeteria riot. The riot is especially emblematic of the Tenderloin, its people, and their struggles; its resilience and inspirational nature of its legacy extend the riot’s significance in the Tenderloin’s history, and for the struggle to improve the lives of people who live and move through this legendary and infamous neighborhood. The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot play will hold important space for this extraordinary story and community, inviting people to experience and empathize with a powerful act of queer resistance and community solidarity. Join us at the “new” Compton’s Cafeteria on Larkin St.; let’s make history together!
The Compton's Cafeteria Riot play project is made possible in part by the National Endowment of the Arts, the City of San Francisco, the Rainin Foundation, the Tenderloin Community Benefit District, and the California Arts Council but your contribution as sponsor will provide essential support to make this vision for the neighborhood a reality.
Sponsorship Benefits
The Tenderloin Museum welcomes support in any amount. Below is a listing of our sponsorship levels and benefits—inspired by The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot play. We are happy to discuss custom benefits at your request.
Exclusive Event Sponsor - $50,000
Most prominent logo placement on promotional materials (including signage at the venue, in the program, and on our website).
10 Free Tickets to the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot Play.
Exclusive preview of the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot Play.
Exclusive VIP party with the cast and crew of the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot Play.
Complimentary Tenderloin Museum membership for 10 employees (can be shared amongst employees).
If you are interested in additional perks or specific recognition, please don't hesitate to reach out. We are happy to work with you to find the most appropriate way to acknowledge your substantial contribution.
Star - $25,000
Prominent logo placement on promotional materials (including signage at the venue, in the program, and on our website).
6 Free Tickets to the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot Play.
Exclusive VIP event with the cast and crew.
Complimentary Tenderloin Museum membership for 5 employees (can be shared amongst employees).
Theater Director - $10,000
Prominent logo placement on promotional materials (including signage at the venue, in the program, and on our website).
5 Free Tickets to the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot Play.
Complimentary Tenderloin Museum membership for 3 employees (can be shared amongst employees).
Playwright - $5,000
Acknowledgement on promotional materials (including signage at the venue, in the program, and on our website).
4 Free Tickets to the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot Play.
Stage Manager - $2,500
Acknowledgement on promotional materials (including signage at the venue, in the program, and on our website).
3 Free Tickets to the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot Play.
Costume Designer - $1,000
Acknowledgement on promotional materials (including signage at the venue, in the program, and on our website).
2 Free Tickets to the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot Play.
Help Us Make History.
For more info on becoming a Sponsor, email us at ComptonsCafeteriaRiot@gmail.com