Market Street Cinema
Market Street Cinema was a historical theatre located on Market Street in the Mid-Market district, San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1912 by David and Sid Grauman as the Imperial Theater.[1] It was converted into a movie theatre as the Premiere Theatre (1929) and the United Artists Theatre (1931).
Imperial Theater | |
Market Street Cinema in 2012 | |
Address | 1077 Market Street San Francisco |
---|---|
Coordinates | 37.780834°N 122.4139685°W |
Capacity | 1,485 |
Construction | |
Opened | December 22, 1912 |
Closed | February, 2013 |
Years active | 101 |
Architect | Clifford A. Balch |
The benefit world premiere of Dirty Harry was held here[2] on December 22, 1971.[3][4]
In 1972 it was renamed Market Street Cinema and was used through the early 2000s as an adult entertainment venue.[5] The role of the theatre in San Francisco's sex industry in the 1980s was documented in a photo essay by photographer Leon Mostovoy.[6] In October 2015, the San Francisco Planning Commission approved a plan to demolish the theatre and replace it with an eight-story building.[7]
Market Street Cinema is considered haunted in popular culture: it features in a 2013 episode of Ghost Adventures (season 7, episode 25)[8] and was used as a shooting location by filmmaker Charles Webb for a low-budget horror movie called G-String Horror.[9]
On August 15, 2016, Mint Minx Press published the novella Market Street Cinema by author Michele Machado, narrating the fictional account of a dancer working at the club in 1998.[10]
See also
References
- "Let's Break Down the History of the Market Street Cinema". Curbed SF. Retrieved 2015-10-24.
- "1077 Market Street (Grauman's Imperial, 1912; Imperial, 1916; Premier, 1929; United Artists, 1931; Loew's, 1970; Market Street Cinema, 1972)". Upfromthedeep.com. Retrieved December 20, 2013.
- "KPIX-TV newsclip from the world premiere of Dirty Harry". Diva.sfsu.edu. Retrieved December 20, 2013.
- "download MPEG4 newsclip". Archived from the original on July 23, 2012. Retrieved December 20, 2013.
- "Market Street Cinema in San Francisco, CA - Cinema Treasures". cinematreasures.org. Retrieved 2015-10-24.
- "Leon Mostovoy: Market Street Cinema | ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives at the USC Libraries". one.usc.edu. Retrieved 2015-10-24.
- "Residential complex to replace century-old theater on Market Street - The San Francisco Examiner". The San Francisco Examiner. Retrieved 2015-10-24.
- "Ghost Adventures: Market Street Cinema". Internet Movie Database. Retrieved 24 October 2015.
- Barmann, Jay. "What Will Become of the Historic, Quite Possibly Haunted, Market Street Cinema?". SFist. Archived from the original on 2015-11-01. Retrieved 2015-10-24.
- Machado, Michele (2016). Market Street Cinema. United States: Mint Minx Press. ISBN 0692551352.