Step Back to 1966: Experience the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot
“See you at Compton’s.” That phrase hits different once you’ve sat in the booth, had your coffee topped off by a queen in heels, and watched the Tenderloin of 1966 rise around you like a ghost that never left.
The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot play — an immersive show produced by the Tenderloin Museum and staged in a meticulously recreated 1960s diner on Larkin Street — isn’t just theater. It’s a time machine, a history lesson, and a punch to the gut in equal measure. From the moment you walk in, you’re a customer. Not in a metaphorical sense—you are literally seated at a booth or the diner counter, sipping diner coffee and eating pancakes while Wanda Jackson plays from the jukebox and the cast buzzes around you. It’s immersive. It’s alive. It’s community.
But don’t let the warm lighting and retro decor fool you, this isn’t nostalgia. This is a riot.
Co-written by Collette LeGrande, Mark Nassar, and Donna Personna and directed by Ezra Reaves, the play tells the story of the 1966 Compton’s Cafeteria Riot, a pivotal moment in LGBTQ+ history when trans women, drag queens, and sex workers fought back against constant police harassment in San Francisco’s Tenderloin district. It happened three years before Stonewall, but most people still don’t know it. This play makes sure you do.
I was lucky (or maybe unlucky?) enough to sit in the splash zone. When the first cup of coffee was thrown, it wasn’t stagey — it was explosive. It hit the wall behind me with enough force to shut everybody up. That was the moment I realized: this isn’t just a reenactment. This is what rage looks like when it finally boils over.
The performances are raw and lived-in. Rusty, portrayed by Shane Zaldivar, is a shy, timid, but beautiful trans woman who shares her heart-wrenching story of being raped. Her confrontation with the beat cop, Officer Johnson — played with chilling intensity by Tony Cardoza — reaches a boiling point when he puts his hands around her throat. After he’s pulled off her, she throws that cup of coffee, and it’s ON.
Suki, played by Jaylyn Abergas, and her sailor boy toy Frankie, portrayed by Jonah Hezekiah Bessellieu, bring a tender yet tragic dynamic to the diner. The beautiful waitresses of Compton’s, Shirley (Barbara Pond) and the owner Gus (Steve Menasche), add layers of authenticity to the setting. The narrative is guided by Robyn Adams as “Older Vicky,” with the stunning Matthew Giesecke playing young Vicky in their first acting role.
The ever-so-handsome Al Niotta plays Adrian, one part of the Vanguard, with his counterpart Dixie portrayed by Maurice André San-Chez. Nicki, with the most stunning voice, is brought to life by Lavale Williams-Davis. She sat next to me at the diner counter, chatted me up, and asked me if I was gonna go to the protest. I said, “HECK YEAH!”
And when the cop enters the diner? You could feel the temperature drop. It was chilling. The audience went dead quiet. It wasn’t fear for the character’s safety — it was fear for our own. That’s how well the play collapses the distance between then and now.
After the show, I talked to a few cast members. They told me this version feels different than the 2018 production. “It’s not to compare then to now,” one of them said, “but to rally.” That line stuck with me. Because that’s exactly what it felt like: a rally disguised as a play. A living act of resistance.
There’s pain here, sure. But also joy. Banter. Camp. Laughter. These women don’t just survive, they sparkle. The humor is sharp because it had to be. There are scenes where the audience is roaring with laughter, and five minutes later you’re holding your breath as the cops close in.
The attention to detail is wild: Vanguard zines passed around, sly nods to the Queen’s Tank, and an intergenerational cast that makes the whole thing feel like a lineage instead of a lesson. And let’s be real—this isn’t just a story about 1966. It’s about now. Anti-trans laws are being introduced and passed every week. The fear and violence that sparked the riot? Still here. Still deadly.
But so is the defiance. So is the power. So is the joy.
This show doesn’t wrap up with a neat moral or a historical plaque. It lingers. It hums in your chest after you’ve left the diner and stepped back into the Tenderloin. It whispers to anyone who’s ever been told to be quiet, to shrink, to disappear. It says: you deserve to be seen. Loudly, completely, joyfully. And if you’re young, and queer, and trying to figure out where you fit in this story—know that you’re already part of it. You’re what comes next.
The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot isn’t just a show you should see. It’s a space you need to sit in, feel, and carry with you. Because this history isn’t behind us. It’s right here in the room.
So yeah—see you at Compton’s. You can get your tickets right here.
Howdy! My name is Katy Atchison and I'm an Associate Editor for Broke-Ass Stuart.
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