The longtime home of the annual Academy Awards ceremony has been sold. In a newly closed deal, an investment group led by producer Elie Samaha, who also owns the TCL Chinese Theatre, has bought the Dolby Theatre.
Producer With Checkered History Eyes Purchase of Dolby Theatre, Home to Oscars
Avison Young, the real estate firm that represented the buyer, Samaha’s JEBS Hollywood Entertainment LLC, announced the sale of the 180,000-sq-ft Dolby Theatre on Tuesday and said the deal also includes surface parking lots totaling 1.45 acres. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed.
The 3,400-seat Dolby has been been managed by investment firm Canyon Partners and owned by California Public Employees’ Retirement System. In July, The Hollywood Reporter had reported that Samaha, whose properties have included the Hollywood restaurant Yamashiro and the Fox Theatre and the Vogue Theatre, was in talks to purchase the venue. Samaha holds producing credit titles on features including The Whole Nine Yards , Get Carter , The Boondock Saints and Battlefield Earth , among other movies.
Chris Bonbright, the Avison Young principal and managing director repping the buyer, stated, “The new ownership intends to continue its association with the Academy Awards while significantly increasing the number and variety of live performances, including many renowned Latin and other international acts.”
The investment vehicle, JEBS Hollywood Entertainment, that bought the Dolby includes Samaha, SMB Equities’ Sherwin Jarol, former Sony Pictures exec Jeff Sagansky, LAZ Parking founder Jonah Lazowski, United Arab Emirates Sheikh Abdulla Bin Mohamed Al Qasimi’s Master Investment Group and a firm titled Two Girls Holdings, LLC, the real estate company stated.
How the Oscars Celebrated Cinema and Its Crafts
The Oscars moved to the venue, then named the Kodak Theatre, for the 2002 ceremony that saw Ron Howard’s A Beautiful Mind win best picture. In 2012, Dolby Laboratories inked a 20-year deal for naming rights to the venue until 2032. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has a deal that runs until 2028 to host the Oscars at the venue.
Prior to setting up its base at the Art Deco-themed Hollywood Boulevard and Highland Avenue retail complex that sits next to Madame Tussauds, Loews Hollywood and the star-laden Walk of Fame sidewalk, the Academy Awards was earlier hosted at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.
The 475,000-sq-ft shopping center that surrounds the Dolby, now called Ovation Hollywood, was itself sold in 2019 to private equity real estate firms DJM and Gaw Capital USA, which unveiled a renovated retail and entertainment space on the 7.6-acre lot last fall.
Bonbright added of the Dolby sale, “JEBS Hollywood Entertainment is an ideal synergistic owner-operator of this world-famous entertainment venue.”
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