Alhambra Theatre

YouTube video showing the inside of the Alhambra in it’s current life as a Crunch Fitness location

https://youtu.be/khdf46TVRzc

Alahambra is the first one pictured.

https://www.wired.com/story/americas-grand-movie-palaces-gallery/?fbclid=IwAR2A1U3TXQ5VTgV7OhxB-erz64aJSnXNK5lynSkrJyS8-DHIRQ0r_ZEMuJs

This reopened as a twin cinema on July 24th, 1974. Ad in the photo section.

I remember being excited to see Altman’s “Buffalo Bill & the Indians, or Sitting Bull’s history Lesson” there in 1976 in one of the twin auditoriums. In fact, I was so stoked to see Paul Newman and Harvey Keitel in a film together, I endured two back-to-back showings. Pretty dull. Today, you won’t find many film buffs mentioning “Buffalo Bill” in the same breath as MASH, Nashville, The Player, Short Cuts, or Gosford Park. I was 13 in 1976 and in love with the movies was my excuse. Would have loved to have seen a good film there when it converted back to single screen.

In June 1926 the Rudolph Wurlitzer company shipped a pipe organ to the Alhambra in San Francisco. It was Wurlitzer’s opus 1364, a style “D,” 2 manuals, 6 ranks in a single chamber: an unusually small organ for a theatre of this size and quality. It was removed around 1960 and supposedly still exists in a private residence.

An article about the Alhambra and its current use as a gym:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/11/26/MNK01M3CQH.DTL&ao=2

For a while after the 1988 restoration to a single screen house, Disney used the Alhambra as its showcase theater in San Francisco when its new films were released, although I do not think the studio had a hand in the restoration as was the case of the El Capitain in Hollywood.

since this theater is a decent size does anyone know if it
was ever used by the studios to present films on an exclusive
roadshow basis in the period 1955-1972?

View link

spent a long weekend in SF checked out a bunch of old theaters…considering how many have been demolished or are rotting away in a building for 30+ years (newark) it is fine by me to be able to wander around a theater for free even if it currently has a new purpose (like the stanley in jersey city) missing in all of the previous pictures on this site is a good view of the beautiful interior dome…enjoy…too bad i didnt get any other good ones

Here is part of a lawsuit from the early 1980s. Plaintiff lost.

On March 24, 1979, Jocelyn Vargas attended a movie, “Boulevard Nights,” at the Alhambra Theatre on Polk Street in San Francisco. After leaving the theater, as she and her friends were walking down the street to catch a bus, she was shot by someone who, it is alleged, was a “member of the general public prone to violence … who had been attracted to said Alhambra Theatre by the showing of said violent movie … .” Through her mother, as guardian, she has sued various defendants, including petitioners, who are alleged to be the producers of the movie. Her mother, alleging damage for medical treatment and loss of services, is also a plaintiff. Their complaint, as relevant here, is that petitioners “knew, or should have known, that said movie was a violent movie and would attract certain members of the public to view said movie who were prone to violence and who carried weapons … [and] would, or were likely to cause grave bodily injury upon other members of the general public at or near the showing of said movie,” but that petitioners “negligently failed to warn” Jocelyn of these facts, and “negligently failed to take sufficient steps to protect patrons,” such as herself, “at and near said Alhambra Theatre.” In a second cause of action, plaintiffs allege in addition that petitioners “willfully allowed the showing of said movie to the general public, knowing and thereby impliedly representing to members of the general public … that said movie could be viewed in safety,” that they “intended that patrons, such as Jocelyn Vargas, should rely on their representations,” and she did so rely, to her detriment.

My father Elmer Thomas Davis worked for the Alhambra Theater in the late 20’s . At that time all the first run theaters had one or more full time artists that produced beautiful posters of the upcoming attractions. They also created other lobby displays appropriate for the movie of the day. My father was a talented artist and worked for a number of theaters in this capacity in San Francisco, Sacramento, and Cleveland in the thirties. He was known as a lobby display man (per the union). I wonder what happened to all these wonderful posters that were made during this time?

i’ve been planning for years to catch a movie at the Alhambra, only to see it, on the news, invaded by a horde of narcissistic healthnuts jumping around like a bunch of monkeys on meth. where is st. francis, patron saint of san francisco and the disadvantaged- which in this case are the vintage movie houses that are being robbed, raped and pillaged by ruthless real estate interests aided and abetted by an insensitve, ignorant gaggle of myopic philistines hellbent on destroying our precious cultural legacy. the 1906 earthquake did less damage to sf than the current mob of selfserving culture vultures.

I lived in the Frisco Bay area from 1971 to 1978 after moving out there from Chicago and I attended this theatre. Kinda reminds me of the great movie palaces of Chicago, Los Angeles and New York.