San Francisco Theatres: The Gayety / CounterPulse Theatre

80 Turk St. | map |

Opening: February 15, 1963 as the Gayety Theatre with "Steam Heat." Previously the site had been a Tenderloin bar called the Buccaneer. It had often been in trouble with the law because of alleged prostitution activities. The building, now the CounterPulse Theatre, is on the north side of the street between Mason and Taylor, almost across the street from the long-gone Peekarama.

Website: www.counterpulse.org | our-new-home

Jack Tillmany took the photo in April 1965. He comments: "In those days, 'Gayety' still leaned towards its traditional dictionary interpretation, so it was strictly a females entertaining males enterprise. But, as time went by, eventually led to the inevitable confusion. It held to the 'Gayety' identification until April 1977, then changed the 'Y' to 'I' and became the 'Gaiety' to August 1980. Same problem. By this time, they were fighting a losing battle. As a last resort, that troublesome third letter was once more changed to 'L' and it became the 'Gal-ety.'

"Meantime, in a former book store next door, at 90 Turk, Fantasy in Flesh aka The Film Den opened in early 1979, offering the opportunity to 'See and talk to a Nude Girl for $1.' If you're wondering about the details, you sat in a tiny booth, and talked to her over the telephone thru bulletproof glass. An interesting side issue: Susan B. Anthony dollars had just made their appearance, and received an almost unanimous rejection from the USA coin oriented public, for obvious reasons, most of them now well known. But Susie found full time work in countless X-rated arcades, such as this. You purchased a roll or two of the little buggers when you bought your ticket, ($25 per roll), and kept putting them in the slot to keep the 'conversation' with the 'Nude Girl' going (at $1 per minute), whenever your time ran out.

Donald Johanson adds: "When I worked at the Warfield, the back door of the booth opened up to the view of the Gayety. At night you could see them filming their stuff in the windows above the marquee. The Warfield booth was on the 4th or 5th floor."

Closing: The date is unknown. The space was called The Dollhouse in its last incarnation as a porno venue.

Reopening: The building and the theatre's vertical are still there on Turk St. CounterPulse acquired the building in late 2014 and did a number of events with the space more or less as it was. Their renovation, a design by Jensen Architects, began in February 2015 and reopened in March 2016. Thanks to Matt Weimer for spotting the "Our New Home" page about the project on the CounterPulse website. The interior is entirely new. 43 photos of the renovation project are on Flickr.

Seating: 108, plus a studio space upstairs.

A pre-renovation lobby view. Note the cutouts in the windows from the porno days. Photo: CounterPulse - Flickr - February 2015

A view toward the stage. Photo: CounterPulse - Flickr - February 2015

The rear of the house pre-renovation. Photo: CounterPulse - Flickr - February 2015

Looking toward Turk St. in the gutted building. Photo: Cesar Rubio for Jensen Architects - August 2015

A section of the new interior from Jensen Architects. The main theatre space is on the ground floor with the studio up on the 2nd.

One level of the three-story lobby. Photo: Cesar Rubio for Jensen Architects - 2016

A look down to the basement space. Photo: Cesar Rubio for Jensen Architects - 2016

The main theatre. Photo: Cesar Rubio for Jensen Architects - 2016

The view from onstage. Photo: Cesar Rubio for Jensen Architects - 2016

Up the stairs to the second floor studio space. Photo: Cesar Rubio for Jensen Architects - 2016

The 2nd floor studio. Photo: Cesar Rubio for Jensen Architects - 2016

More exterior views:

The photo is an August 21, 1964 view by Alan J. Canterbury that's in the San Francisco Public Library collection.

A November 1966 photo by Tom Gray from the Jack Tillmany collection.

An undated Bill Koska photo in the collection of the San Francisco Public Library.

A 1970 shot from a KRON news report that year. Thanks to Bob Ristelhueber for spotting it for a post on the BAHT Facebook page.

A c.1979 photo by Tom Gray from the Jack Tillmany collection. Note the name change to Gaiety.

A c.1980 photo by Tom Gray with the theatre renamed the Galety. Note the vertical still saying Gaiety. It's from the Jack Tillmany collection.

Gary Parks comments: "Boy--did they really go cheap in trying to turn that 'I' into an 'L'...they didn't ever alter the neon tube! The vertical on the place is clearly a c. 40s sign cabinet--pressed into use for the new establishment."

A 1982 photo of the theatre as the Galety from the Jack Tillmany collection. He comments: "I love this photo of a couple of San Francisco's Mounted Finest, complete with trendy sideburns, trotting by, apparently oblivious to the name of the movie, another magical moment captured by Tom Gray."