4-Star Theatre
2200 Clement Street,
San Francisco,
CA
94121
2200 Clement Street,
San Francisco,
CA
94121
11 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 30 comments
A Martin Scorsese retrospective at the 4 Star for the month of September - “Scorsese: More Than A Gangster”. SFGate article at the link.
Scorsese Film Fest
After all these years the 4 Star now has STEREO SURROUND!!!! Too bad they did not tear out the tiny back side art space and enlarge the whole place into one semi large movie space with curtains. At least they are open with new sound.
Grand opening ad (Facebook) posted.
please update, total seats 140 and one screen
article from the SF Examiner
https://www.sfexaminer.com/our_sections/faces/4-star-theater-in-san-francisco-reopens-in-december/article_8b0ec51e-702d-11ed-ba43-bf5182a3417b.html
Please update, new capacity 140 seats reopening on December 8, 2022 according to the San Francisco Examiner, it will be one screen and the second screen will be converter into a coffee shop at the theatre.
From 4 Star Theatres facebook pageHello friends & neighbors! We wanted to update you on some excellent 4 Star news! On Wednesday we went to the legendary Fantasy Studios in Berkeley, where so many of the world’s greatest albums were recorded and the greatest movies mixed, and picked up TWO GORGEOUS 35MM PROJECTORS for the 4 Star Theater! The wonderful people at the Berkeley FILM Foundation donated them to the theater and gave us an amazing tour through the hallowed ground of Fantasy Studios! Having twin 35mm projectors at the 4 Star will give us the ability to project in changeover style, which will give us access to so many incredible 35mm films. We are truly thrilled and grateful! Renovation of the 4 Star is moving along briskly, and we feel like we are still on track for a summer 2022 reopening!!! As always, you can check in on the Balboa Theater, Vogue Theater, 4 Star, and Park at CINEMASF.CO
From Lee Neighborhod Theatres website: Posted photo of it in photos section.
Dear Friends and Neighbors, The 4 Star theatre has been sold and transferred to new ownership. We wish them all the best and we will continue the lasting tradition of preserving independent cinemas in San Francisco. We at Lee neighborhood theatres would like to thank the Bay Area for an amazing thirty years of screening countless independent films along with an array of film festivals and events. We will continue to showcase films at our Presidio and Marina theatres located in the Marina district. Again, thank you all for supporting Lee Neighborhood Theatres for the last THREE decades! Lee Neighborhood Theatres
I forgot to add the 4 **** Theatre has just mono sound last time I was in the cinema. Please put in a stereo surround system when you remodel the place and some color lights.
Let’s hope the new managers of the small 4 **** Theatre in SF fix the main stage curtains to make them work again as they don’t bother fixing the curtains at the Vogue and Balboa Theatres in SF they run. Bring some showmanship back and program some 35mm movie classics. Time to rip out the tiny add on screen in the back side and make the cinema one again!
Please update website,https://www.cinemasf.com/balboa/ It in their website coming soon
The 4 Star has been sold. The new owner has hired Adam Bergeron, owner-operator of the Balboa Theater and operator of the Vogue Theater, to program the 4 Star.
Details here with links to an SF Chronicle story about the sale and also the CinemaSF.com website that oversees the 3 theaters.
Became Four Star on February 3rd, 1946. small ad posted.
Jack Tillmany’s history of the 4 Star (published in 2013) for the Western Neighborhoods Project on the OutsideLands website:
4 Star
Can anyone post some interior photos?
Exterior photos from July 2015.
I visited this theater yesterday and was a little disappointed. I was in the larger cinema, which is largely intact from its single-screen days. It was quite dark in there before the show. There was no curtain, or else it was open. There was some interesting decoration around the procenium, but with lack of stage lights, you could hardly see it. If a theater has no curtain, at least they could flood the screen with colored light to make the place more attractive.
A 2010 photo can be seen here.
Here is an undated photo:
http://tinyurl.com/oy672o
I like marquees. It’s subjective.
Here is another view of the marquee:
http://tinyurl.com/3dcuj6
Excellent news! The Lees have won the fight to keep the theater! Acoording to today’s SF Chronicle, the church who owned the building agreed in mediation back in July to sell the property to the owners of the 4-Star, Frank & Lida Lee. They had 150 days to assemble the financing for the $1.45 million purchase price. On Wednedsay, Frank Lee said that they had beaten that deadline by a week and that the deal has cleared escrow & was finalized on Monday. Lee does plan to do some “long-planned renovations”. According to the attorney for the church (previous building owner), “With all the adverse publicity & politics, it would have been an uphill battle to build their church, so they bit the bullet & sold it, at an overall loss, to the Lees.” The article did mention that the Lees had enlisted the help of the San Francisco Neighborhood Theater Foundation.
Again, according to Lee, the 4-Star seats a total of 249 people (not 365 as stated above, though that may have indeed been its seating capacity as a single-screen). Hate to nitpick like this but…
Since WHEN has the 4-Star had a third screen? The Screens section should list “Twin” (as Frank Lee already pointed out), not “Triplex.”
Here is a photo of the La Bonita in 1919:
View link