Eight months after Casa Bonita’s actors went on a short strike in a push for better wages, the union still has not reached a deal on its first contract.
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The restaurant’s cliff divers, magicians, puppeteers and roving performers have been bargaining with management for more than a year, after officially voting to unionize in November 2024. A mediator has been involved in negotiations since the strike, which occurred last year on Halloween weekend, said lead negotiator Andrea Hoeschen, assistant executive director and general counsel for Actors’ Equity Association.
Hoeschen said the primary outstanding issue is wages, though the actors are also seeking workplace protections. Casa Bonita serves thousands of diners each week, and actors previously detailed several incidents involving guests that had staff concerned for their safety. Some of their concerns included insufficient training, scheduling and safety from “abusive patrons emboldened by alcohol,” The Denver Post has reported.
The restaurant, located at 6715 W. Colfax Ave. in Lakewood, is unique in that dining there is only one part of the experience. The Mexico-themed eatery’s facade is giant pink tower, and inside, there is a 30-foot waterfall from which divers jump into a pool every 20 minutes. There are also puppet shows, magic shows and roving performers who interact with guests while they wander through the 52,000-square-foot space.
Another thing that sets Casa Bonita apart is its owners. Colorado-raised celebrities Trey Parker and Matt Stone, creators of the TV show “South Park,” purchased the restaurant out of bankruptcy in 2021 and sunk a reported $40 million into renovating it. It reopened to the public in 2023.
Parker and Stone also made headlines in 2025 for inking a $1.5 billion streaming deal with Paramount Global for “South Park,” according to the Los Angeles Times.
Trey Parker and Matt Stone on why buying Casa Bonita was ‘dumb thing to do’
At Casa Bonita, the union’s roughly 70 members make between $21 and $30 an hour, depending on their role, Hoeschen said. Current job listings show the venue is seeking to hire a person for the “roaming cast” at $23 an hour and a “water entertainment cast member” (a.k.a. diver) for $27 an hour. Hoeschen said the actors are among the lowest-paid employees at the establishment.
“They make less than servers and bartenders, for example, and they do not get to participate in the tip pool. So the actual wage differential between entertainers and servers is dollars per hour,” she said.
“At Casa Bonita, we value all of our team members and their well-being,” the restaurant’s management said in an emailed statement. “As a policy, we do not comment on ongoing labor negotiations.”
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The Actors’ Equity Association has filed seven unfair labor charges against the restaurant, alleging management retaliated against employees who were part of the strike and has engaged in bad faith bargaining, among other charges. The first came last October when Casa Bonita hosted a fall pop-up called Casa BOOnita and suspended the use of roving actors for one month.
While the actors are not currently considering another strike, Hoeschen said they are using other tactics to raise awareness about negotiations as they await the results of the unfair labor practice investigations.
For example, actor Brooke Shields, president of the Actors’ Equity Association, stopped by Casa Bonita in the spring to personally deliver a letter to management asking for better staff wages.
“It was slightly an ambush,” Shields recently told CNN. “You try doing things respectfully, and then you’re not met with equal respect… so you have to resort to other tactics.”
Casa Bonita serves about 12,000 people per week, Stone said in a recent interview on “Jimmy Kimmel Live.” Hoeschen wants those folks to know that “when they are going to Casa Bonita, they are subsidizing Matt and Trey’s ego project, along with the underpaid workers.”
“Matt and Trey are not giving workers the attention they deserve. They’re not respecting the collective bargaining process,” she added. “In doing so, they are not doing right by this project they claim to have started for the good of the Denver community.”
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