Degen Pener previously wrote about why more people working in Hollywood seem to be smoking cigarettes.
Once upon a time, Los Angeles basked obliviously under the West Coast sun in the belief that we had it relatively good when it came to humankind’s age-old nemesis: rats. At least we didn’t have problems on the order of infamously infested New York City, the long-undisputed rat capital of the USA. NYC has long had a well-deserved reputation for having the chonkiest, filthiest vermin in the country. Up until 2024, NYC residents simply put most trash bags out on the street, creating veritable buffets for the fearless foragers. (Two years ago, New York began the process of requiring secure bins for all trash, an initiative that is due to be fully rolled out by… 2031.)
And don’t even get us started on Pizza Rat — we still have nightmares.
But Los Angeles is nothing if not competitive, and lately our local vermin appear to be ready for their close-up, in some of the city’s most exclusive establishments no less.
In the past two months, a slew of Hollywood-loved restaurants, clubs and hotels have been dinged by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health for vermin issues. They range from the industry-dense private members club San Vicente Bungalows, The Valorian Hotel (formerly the Mondrian) and the Peninsula Beverly Hills to Dan Tana’s in WeHo, Genghis Cohen on Fairfax and Jitlada (famed for its incredibly spicy Thai cuisine) in Hollywood.
A key caveat, as these headlines see heavy rotation on social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok, is that rats weren’t necessarily the issue in all cases; when it comes to vermin, the health department’s inspection reports broadly cite businesses for the presence of “insects, rodents, birds or animals” without going into further detail. (Rodents could also mean mice or squirrels.)
Still, the narrative has taken hold: Rat numbers must be rising, and the ritzier the affected establishment, the louder the chatter. On social media, comments range from grossed-out reactions (“How in the hell did these places get so bad that the board of health has to CLOSE YOU DOWN?! So disgusting.”) to hot takes (“Is Disney filming a new live action Ratatouille in Los Angeles?”).
For this story, I reached out to teams at those businesses, hospitality workers and PR reps, animal experts and other sources close to the action (nearly all declined to comment) to understand how restaurants are responding, how wide the infestations really are, what could be causing them and what to do about them. Read on for the details — and yes, they are dirty — plus some reassuring reality checks from rodent pros.
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