Having read the Daily Press article posted above, I am going to have to amend my comment about the terrazzo. Putting the clues together—the sawing of the terrazzo into sections rather than just jackhammering it, and an earlier comment that they had “set it aside,” plus knowing as I do that a skilled terrazzo contractor can indeed set a whole pavement back and match and fill the resulting seams to near-perfection—I do believe this is what has happened, and I applaud it. At least the entrance will have its old floor. Now, here’s hoping that they will reconstruct the original entry ceiling.
I was in Santa Monica Saturday and stopped by the (Nu)Wilshire and walked all around it, looking in the entrance and backstage doors. Lots of construction is underway inside, and there is not a trace of historic interior left, except for about one third of the original ticket lobby ceiling which was above the later one. It was pink plaster with grey bands around the edge. Holes were still visible where the cables had been hung through it to suspend the later ceiling. It looks as if the marquee is being kept. Also, vertical ribbed walls which were uncovered behind the poster cases are in the process of being recreated. Workmen were busy smoothing a new concrete sidewalk surface in front of the building. Sadly, I noticed that the green and black terrazzo floor of the entranceway had been sawn into squares, presumably for removal. No changes whatsoever were evident in the overall design of the facade itself. I looked up into the fly tower, and only the main steel braces for the stagehouse grid are still there. The concrete proscenium opening is very evident, but not a scrap of decoration remains. An auto entrance has been cut into the side of the theatre from the alley to the East of the building. This opens to a ramp leading into a basement parking garage.
Does anyone have recent photos of the new marquee? I was surprised to see Chuck 1231’s link above to that 1968 American Classic Images photo which shows the original marquee and vertical still 100% intact at that late date. Yet, at some point, they were sacrificed for a product of the Let’s See How Boring We Can Make It school of marquee design sometime between then and the 1980s. I’ll venture a guess the original signage vanished during the aesthetically depraved 1970s, when if it wasn’t made of weathered wood and rusty nails, it was banished. And plain plastic was the fallback when no design whatsoever was asked for.
I am very glad to see the new color scheme, which has the feel of what John Eberson did in his atmospheric theatres. I toured the Carpenter Center (Loew’s Richmond) in 1992, and the previous paint “restoration” from the 80s was far too gaudy and was done in glossy paint. It was Eberson if he had hooked-up with Peter Max and The Grateful Dead. Now, at least from the video, it looks like Eberson by Eberson! Congratulations on a job well done!
The vertical sign is a reproduction, dating to 1982, according to the new book by Gary Lacher, Theatres of Portland. It is really stunning, particularly at night. The original said PORTLAND, was later relettered PARAMOUNT, and the replica was created to look like the sign as originally lettered.
Just weighing-in with a little observation here: I have never heard of a Rancho (or El Rancho) drive-in in San Francisco. This is not to say there may not have been one. Jack Tillmany’s Theatres of San Francisco makes no mention of it. More than this, though—the photos show a terrain that is just too flat behind the screen for anywhere within San Francisco. Also, the design of screen tower architectural embellishment is of a style and elaborateness I have never seen in the Bay Area—thinking back to drive-ins I either saw or viewed photos of. There was an EL Rancho in San Jose, but its screen tower had a cowboy on horseback, let alone the EL in the name. The Rancho in question looks like a type that would have been built in Southern California and areas throughout the Southwest.
I am glad to hear that not only does the interior preservation plan include the 1941 Heinsbergen murals, but the Ionic columns, (organ) grilles, urns (and eagles clutching shields, I might add!) which are hidden behing the plain draped walls on either side of the stage/screen. For those who have not seen them, they are a very well preserved and dramatic remnant of the original 1924 interior, and bear considerable resemblance to the type of ornament inside the Castro, in both form and coloration.
Regarding Joe Vogel’s assumption based on a 1974 comment made by William David in Box Office magazine: The Los Gatos was not twinned at that time. I attended there several times in 1989, and the auditorium was a single. The sidewalls had their original plasterwork—frames, moldings, medallions—from the Teens. There was a dropped ceiling of perforated acoustical tile, which was plainly hiding further ornament above it, as you could see some plaster pendant elements hanging down below the ceiling tile line on the sidewall pilasters. The proscenium and angled walls flanking it were of 1940s vintage, plain and streamlined, with the abovementioned maiden figures painted on them, these being the only historic interior decorative elements visible today.
The twinning was done after the Oct 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake closed the theatre for repairs and remodeling.
The 1930s marquee which replaced the original, and which is still on the facade as seen in the photo in the previous post, is exactly the same design as that of the Grand Lake in Oakland, just done in a typical trapezoid shape, as aopposed to the wide sweeping curve which the Grand Lake marquee has partly due to its corner location. I would guess the El Capitan marquee had tubes and color like those of the Grand Lake, and probably animated in a similar or identical fashion.
I have long had the dream that someday the Mission neighborhood will pick itself up to a point where the site of the El Capitan’s auditorium could be built upon with both an underground parking garage and a multistory multiplex. The facade would be restored, the marquee relit and outfitted with digital readerboards, and patrons would walk through the still extant foyer with its plasterwork restored, to the new structure behind. Then, down the street, the New Mission Theatre would be the performing arts center for the area.
The Winema’s architect, Alfred Henry Jacobs, also the designed the following theatres in San Francisco:
California (State, demolished)
Granda (Paramount, demolished)
Curran (still in operation)
My best wishes go to this project. I’ve yet to set foot in the Whiteside, but even seeing the exterior in person is enchanting—a combination of original 1920s brick and cast ornament and a terrific and colorful late moderne marquee. The photos I’ve seen of the inside show a remarkably preserved theatre.
Just an observation: It looks as if the vertical neon sign is older than the actual theater building. The building looks to be of 50s vintage—late 50s at that—but the sign looks to be of late 30s through 40s vintage. Perhaps there was an earlier Trail Theatre, at this location or another, and the sign was salvaged from the earlier building? The chocolate tones of both building and sign are of course from the 70s.
In the 1980s, peeling paint on the side of the office block over this theatre’s entrance and above the shorter facade of the Market Street Cinema next door revealed, however faintly, shadows of a painted sign, “Egyptian Theatre.” That wall has been painted over at least twice since then. Recent removal of some later remodeling around the former entrances of the Guild and Centre has uncovered original Gothic/Baroque cast ornament original to the building. It has some damage, but based on the look of it, these details had been covered over since at least the 40s.
A number of years ago, my friend, the late theatre historian Steve Levin, told me that he either owned or had seen a photo of this theatre’s lobby taken when it was the Egyptian. He said it was obviously a decorating job done on the cheap, with lotus or papyrus patterns done on the walls with stenciling. Certainly it was not a comparatively deluxe Egyptian job like San Francisco’s Alexandria.
The murals in the auditorium—uncovered and restored when Cineplex Odeon took over—were by Los Angeles decorator Heinsbergen. Identical Greco-Deco mythological figures in these murals appear, in a much different arrangement, around the proscenium of the Bay Area’s Cerrito Theatre in El Cerrito, designed by a different architect but decorated by Heinsbergen.
The Regal is currently closed. I walked by it last Sunday. The entrance is boarded up. The vertical sign has the name covered over. The entire building’s facade has been painted dark green for quite a few years, and looks dirtier and dirtier as time goes on. Many decorative details still survive. To the right of the theatre entrance, one storefront transom window is surrounded by remnamts of a deco remodel from the Thirties. If one looks closely little geometric embossed patterns can be seen. With a lot of money and care, the whole building could be made quite handsome once again. As I always do when walking along that part of Market Street, I paused respectfully at the little “seam” of surviving terra cotta ornament from the facade of the Granada/Paramount next door.
Joe Vogel’s post of May 7, 2008 puts my mind at ease about the concrete structure on Broadway which looks from the side like it had to have been a theatre originally. It being the original Sequoia from 1917 until 1929 makes sense. This would explain why Larry Goldsmith would remember the present Fox (former “new” Sequoia) as being the only theatre on Broadway until the advent of the recent Century ‘plex. As for the Redwood, it looks like nothing remains. Nevertheless, as I work in Redwood City, I will have to go to the intersection of California and Winkle Bleck and see the site for myself.
There’s been lots of commentary on the Redwood’s page here on CT. Check it out if you haven’t yet. It’s all news to me, never having seen the Redwood myself.
If one looks closely at the first of the two photos linked to Lost Memory’s April 27 post, a hand painted poster in the display case can be seen, inviting Mothers to make use of the Rio’s Cry Room. I remember this poster, which was hand painted. I have no idea how old it was. Usually it was displayed in a freestanding poster case in the lobby, just inside the entrance doors to the left as you walked in.
Lost Memory’s April 27 post above does not show the Pajaro Theatre this page is devoted to, but rather the Pajaro Showplace that was built in the early 1980s. See the listing for the Galaxy Theatre under Watsonville theaters.
I saw it at the Grand Lake in Oakland, with my mom, plus my cousin, her husband, and their then 5-year-old son. This was only his second or third time ever going out to a movie, and I wanted him to have an early childhood experience of seeing a movie at a classic theatre. It was an experience not lost on him. He wanted his picture taken next to the movie poster which was in one of the columned ornamental niches in the theatre’s outer lobby after the show.
Regarding that fine photo from 1945: When the State was turned into a warehouse for Ford’s department store in 1967, that marquee was removed and the entrance blocked off. The two poster case frames facing the street remained, though filled with stucco. The rest of the facade, including the black and green veined marble along the base, and all of that ornamentation, remained exactly as shown right up until the building’s post-1989 earthquake demolition. The ornamental cartouche and moldings which stick up above the main cornice line were removed and salvaged prior to demolition, as were the ornamental corbels with the cherub faces in their centers. A friend of mine salvaged all the marble along the bottom himself. I have one jagged approximately 6 x 8 inch piece of it which I snagged subsequently.
That image in the above post is the same image shown in black and white at the top of this page. I posted it in the early days of Cinematreasures on behalf of Jack Tillmany. It’s from his collection. How it got on Classic American Images is anyone’s guess.
Having read the Daily Press article posted above, I am going to have to amend my comment about the terrazzo. Putting the clues together—the sawing of the terrazzo into sections rather than just jackhammering it, and an earlier comment that they had “set it aside,” plus knowing as I do that a skilled terrazzo contractor can indeed set a whole pavement back and match and fill the resulting seams to near-perfection—I do believe this is what has happened, and I applaud it. At least the entrance will have its old floor. Now, here’s hoping that they will reconstruct the original entry ceiling.
I was in Santa Monica Saturday and stopped by the (Nu)Wilshire and walked all around it, looking in the entrance and backstage doors. Lots of construction is underway inside, and there is not a trace of historic interior left, except for about one third of the original ticket lobby ceiling which was above the later one. It was pink plaster with grey bands around the edge. Holes were still visible where the cables had been hung through it to suspend the later ceiling. It looks as if the marquee is being kept. Also, vertical ribbed walls which were uncovered behind the poster cases are in the process of being recreated. Workmen were busy smoothing a new concrete sidewalk surface in front of the building. Sadly, I noticed that the green and black terrazzo floor of the entranceway had been sawn into squares, presumably for removal. No changes whatsoever were evident in the overall design of the facade itself. I looked up into the fly tower, and only the main steel braces for the stagehouse grid are still there. The concrete proscenium opening is very evident, but not a scrap of decoration remains. An auto entrance has been cut into the side of the theatre from the alley to the East of the building. This opens to a ramp leading into a basement parking garage.
Wow—what a romantic story, from beginning to end. Thanks Howard, for posting this.
Does anyone have recent photos of the new marquee? I was surprised to see Chuck 1231’s link above to that 1968 American Classic Images photo which shows the original marquee and vertical still 100% intact at that late date. Yet, at some point, they were sacrificed for a product of the Let’s See How Boring We Can Make It school of marquee design sometime between then and the 1980s. I’ll venture a guess the original signage vanished during the aesthetically depraved 1970s, when if it wasn’t made of weathered wood and rusty nails, it was banished. And plain plastic was the fallback when no design whatsoever was asked for.
I am very glad to see the new color scheme, which has the feel of what John Eberson did in his atmospheric theatres. I toured the Carpenter Center (Loew’s Richmond) in 1992, and the previous paint “restoration” from the 80s was far too gaudy and was done in glossy paint. It was Eberson if he had hooked-up with Peter Max and The Grateful Dead. Now, at least from the video, it looks like Eberson by Eberson! Congratulations on a job well done!
The vertical sign is a reproduction, dating to 1982, according to the new book by Gary Lacher, Theatres of Portland. It is really stunning, particularly at night. The original said PORTLAND, was later relettered PARAMOUNT, and the replica was created to look like the sign as originally lettered.
Just weighing-in with a little observation here: I have never heard of a Rancho (or El Rancho) drive-in in San Francisco. This is not to say there may not have been one. Jack Tillmany’s Theatres of San Francisco makes no mention of it. More than this, though—the photos show a terrain that is just too flat behind the screen for anywhere within San Francisco. Also, the design of screen tower architectural embellishment is of a style and elaborateness I have never seen in the Bay Area—thinking back to drive-ins I either saw or viewed photos of. There was an EL Rancho in San Jose, but its screen tower had a cowboy on horseback, let alone the EL in the name. The Rancho in question looks like a type that would have been built in Southern California and areas throughout the Southwest.
The Almaden has recently been given a new facade, with appropriate nods to streamline moderne architecture. Simple, but with a touch of showmanship.
I am glad to hear that not only does the interior preservation plan include the 1941 Heinsbergen murals, but the Ionic columns, (organ) grilles, urns (and eagles clutching shields, I might add!) which are hidden behing the plain draped walls on either side of the stage/screen. For those who have not seen them, they are a very well preserved and dramatic remnant of the original 1924 interior, and bear considerable resemblance to the type of ornament inside the Castro, in both form and coloration.
Regarding Joe Vogel’s assumption based on a 1974 comment made by William David in Box Office magazine: The Los Gatos was not twinned at that time. I attended there several times in 1989, and the auditorium was a single. The sidewalls had their original plasterwork—frames, moldings, medallions—from the Teens. There was a dropped ceiling of perforated acoustical tile, which was plainly hiding further ornament above it, as you could see some plaster pendant elements hanging down below the ceiling tile line on the sidewall pilasters. The proscenium and angled walls flanking it were of 1940s vintage, plain and streamlined, with the abovementioned maiden figures painted on them, these being the only historic interior decorative elements visible today.
The twinning was done after the Oct 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake closed the theatre for repairs and remodeling.
The 1930s marquee which replaced the original, and which is still on the facade as seen in the photo in the previous post, is exactly the same design as that of the Grand Lake in Oakland, just done in a typical trapezoid shape, as aopposed to the wide sweeping curve which the Grand Lake marquee has partly due to its corner location. I would guess the El Capitan marquee had tubes and color like those of the Grand Lake, and probably animated in a similar or identical fashion.
I have long had the dream that someday the Mission neighborhood will pick itself up to a point where the site of the El Capitan’s auditorium could be built upon with both an underground parking garage and a multistory multiplex. The facade would be restored, the marquee relit and outfitted with digital readerboards, and patrons would walk through the still extant foyer with its plasterwork restored, to the new structure behind. Then, down the street, the New Mission Theatre would be the performing arts center for the area.
In the above post, it’s GRANADA, not Granda.
The Winema’s architect, Alfred Henry Jacobs, also the designed the following theatres in San Francisco:
California (State, demolished)
Granda (Paramount, demolished)
Curran (still in operation)
My best wishes go to this project. I’ve yet to set foot in the Whiteside, but even seeing the exterior in person is enchanting—a combination of original 1920s brick and cast ornament and a terrific and colorful late moderne marquee. The photos I’ve seen of the inside show a remarkably preserved theatre.
Just an observation: It looks as if the vertical neon sign is older than the actual theater building. The building looks to be of 50s vintage—late 50s at that—but the sign looks to be of late 30s through 40s vintage. Perhaps there was an earlier Trail Theatre, at this location or another, and the sign was salvaged from the earlier building? The chocolate tones of both building and sign are of course from the 70s.
In the 1980s, peeling paint on the side of the office block over this theatre’s entrance and above the shorter facade of the Market Street Cinema next door revealed, however faintly, shadows of a painted sign, “Egyptian Theatre.” That wall has been painted over at least twice since then. Recent removal of some later remodeling around the former entrances of the Guild and Centre has uncovered original Gothic/Baroque cast ornament original to the building. It has some damage, but based on the look of it, these details had been covered over since at least the 40s.
A number of years ago, my friend, the late theatre historian Steve Levin, told me that he either owned or had seen a photo of this theatre’s lobby taken when it was the Egyptian. He said it was obviously a decorating job done on the cheap, with lotus or papyrus patterns done on the walls with stenciling. Certainly it was not a comparatively deluxe Egyptian job like San Francisco’s Alexandria.
The murals in the auditorium—uncovered and restored when Cineplex Odeon took over—were by Los Angeles decorator Heinsbergen. Identical Greco-Deco mythological figures in these murals appear, in a much different arrangement, around the proscenium of the Bay Area’s Cerrito Theatre in El Cerrito, designed by a different architect but decorated by Heinsbergen.
The Regal is currently closed. I walked by it last Sunday. The entrance is boarded up. The vertical sign has the name covered over. The entire building’s facade has been painted dark green for quite a few years, and looks dirtier and dirtier as time goes on. Many decorative details still survive. To the right of the theatre entrance, one storefront transom window is surrounded by remnamts of a deco remodel from the Thirties. If one looks closely little geometric embossed patterns can be seen. With a lot of money and care, the whole building could be made quite handsome once again. As I always do when walking along that part of Market Street, I paused respectfully at the little “seam” of surviving terra cotta ornament from the facade of the Granada/Paramount next door.
Joe Vogel’s post of May 7, 2008 puts my mind at ease about the concrete structure on Broadway which looks from the side like it had to have been a theatre originally. It being the original Sequoia from 1917 until 1929 makes sense. This would explain why Larry Goldsmith would remember the present Fox (former “new” Sequoia) as being the only theatre on Broadway until the advent of the recent Century ‘plex. As for the Redwood, it looks like nothing remains. Nevertheless, as I work in Redwood City, I will have to go to the intersection of California and Winkle Bleck and see the site for myself.
There’s been lots of commentary on the Redwood’s page here on CT. Check it out if you haven’t yet. It’s all news to me, never having seen the Redwood myself.
If one looks closely at the first of the two photos linked to Lost Memory’s April 27 post, a hand painted poster in the display case can be seen, inviting Mothers to make use of the Rio’s Cry Room. I remember this poster, which was hand painted. I have no idea how old it was. Usually it was displayed in a freestanding poster case in the lobby, just inside the entrance doors to the left as you walked in.
Lost Memory’s April 27 post above does not show the Pajaro Theatre this page is devoted to, but rather the Pajaro Showplace that was built in the early 1980s. See the listing for the Galaxy Theatre under Watsonville theaters.
I saw it at the Grand Lake in Oakland, with my mom, plus my cousin, her husband, and their then 5-year-old son. This was only his second or third time ever going out to a movie, and I wanted him to have an early childhood experience of seeing a movie at a classic theatre. It was an experience not lost on him. He wanted his picture taken next to the movie poster which was in one of the columned ornamental niches in the theatre’s outer lobby after the show.
Regarding that fine photo from 1945: When the State was turned into a warehouse for Ford’s department store in 1967, that marquee was removed and the entrance blocked off. The two poster case frames facing the street remained, though filled with stucco. The rest of the facade, including the black and green veined marble along the base, and all of that ornamentation, remained exactly as shown right up until the building’s post-1989 earthquake demolition. The ornamental cartouche and moldings which stick up above the main cornice line were removed and salvaged prior to demolition, as were the ornamental corbels with the cherub faces in their centers. A friend of mine salvaged all the marble along the bottom himself. I have one jagged approximately 6 x 8 inch piece of it which I snagged subsequently.
That image in the above post is the same image shown in black and white at the top of this page. I posted it in the early days of Cinematreasures on behalf of Jack Tillmany. It’s from his collection. How it got on Classic American Images is anyone’s guess.