636 Jackson St. | map |
Website: GreatStarTheater.org | Great Star on Facebook |
Opened: 1925 as the Great China Theatre, a venue for Chinese Opera. One of the backers was allegedly the Kuomintang, a Chinese nationalist party. The building is on the north side of the street between Kearny and Grant. The pre-opening photo is on Calisphere from the Museum of Performance and Design Performing Arts Library. It was a donation to their collection from May's Photo, the studio that took the photo.
Seating: Perhaps 900 originally, down to 540 in recent years.
Paul Nathan, operator of the Great Star for several years, comments:
"A bit of fun history. The Mandarin (later called the Sun Sing Theatre) opened just a few months before the Great Star (then the Great China Theater). The Great China was going to open first but the Mandarin pulled out some backdrops and put them on the facade of the building so they could open first. They were rival political factions so it was a big deal to be open first."
A projection booth was installed in 1940 and films were then part of the programming. It became the Great Star Theatre sometime around 1960.
Stage information: The proscenium is 32' 6" wide with 14' of
wingspace SR and 13' 6" SL. Stage depth is 24' from the smoke pocket to
the face of the backwall columns. It's one of the few surviving theatres
in the
country with a raked stage. It's about 8" higher upstage. It's a hemp
house with a steel grid using, except for several sets, wood loftblocks
and headblocks. Grid height is 42'. There are
flyfloors both stage right and stage left as well as an additional
pinrail at stage level on stage right.
The asbestos operates stage right, the movie screen is a wire guide
counterweight set operated stage left. The projector is a Barco R6+. An
improvised
corridor serves as dressing rooms behind a temporary wall upstage.
Others are in the basement. All loading is through the house or via
narrow exit passages on either side of the building. There's no rear
access.
A November 13, 1961 flyer. It's another from the Arthur Dong Collection. Thanks, Arthur. He's also the author of the book "Forbidden City U.S.A: Chinatown Nightclubs 1936-1970." It's available on Amazon. Also available is his 1989 documentary "Forbidden City USA."
Around 1970 the theatre got a new marquee and, later in the decade was acquired by Hong Kong producer Run Run Shaw to show his product. It closed as a film house in the 1990s but continued to be occasionally used for Chinese operas.
It had been dark for about a dozen years when George Kaskanlian and Ken Montero stumbled across it and got a ten year lease. See "Great Star Theater preparing to rise again," Sam Whiting's March 2010 SF Gate story about what they had planned for the theatre. They didn't stick around long.
In 2014 Harris Rosenbloom had the theatre and was envisioning a remodeling program that was outlined on Kickstarter. Rosenbloom's tenure came to a bad end when the body of a 31 year old woman was found in the theatre. SF Gate had that story in May 2015. The venue was taken over in 2015 by Paul Nathan who upgraded the facility with new sound, lighting and projection equipment. He then mounted a strong program of legit offerings, cabaret shows and occasional films.
The theatre closed in late 2017 with Paul Nathan operating it at the time. The closure was due to problems with Julia Lee, an uncooperative landlord. The story was covered in a January 2018 story on Hoodline.
Status: It reopened in 2021 and is now a non-profit operation. The Chronicle had a June 2021 story about the theatre's reopening: "Historic S.F. theater, where Bruce Lee used to watch opera, reopens..."
Alice Chu and Roger Pincombe are the new operators. See Roger's website: RogerPincombe.com.
It was announced in
November 2020 that Pincombe had signed a ten year lease on the
building. He offers a season of locally produced shows. Former
operator Paul Nathan is also part of the management and occasionally
produces shows himself.
Lobby views:
A men's room sign at the Great Star. It's a photo by Rebecca A. McBride from the book ""Left in the Dark: Portraits of San Francisco Movie Theatres" by McBride with Julie Lindow. The photo appears on a 2010 post about the book on the blog Mubi.
The auditorium:
A 20s photo taken by Brooks. It's on Calisphere from the collection of the Museum of Performance and Design Performing Arts Library.
The pinrail stage right at stage level. The ladder at the left gets you up to the flyfloor above, not used much in later years. It's a photo by Rebecca A. McBride from the book ""Left in the Dark: Portraits of San Francisco Movie Theatres" by McBride with Julie Lindow. The photo appears on a 2010 post about the book on the blog Mubi.
More exterior views:
An October 9, 1920 view west on Jackson from Kearny. The squat building on the site before the theatre arrived is on the right. Thanks to Jack Tillmany for spotting the DPW/Horace Chaffee photo on the Open SF History Project website.
The theatre had a float in the September 12, 1925 parade for the California Diamond Jubilee celebration. The photo appears in a scrapbook of Hamilton Henry Dobbins that's in the California State Library collection.
A 1955 view from the Facebook page Vintage Kodachrome Slides. Thanks to Lily Castello for sharing it on the BAHT Facebook page.
A 50s view from the Glenn Koch collection. It's one he shared in a post on the BAHT Facebook page.
A late 50s view by an unknown photographer. Thanks to Jack Tillmany for sharing this version of the photo from his collection. He notes that it's 1956 Packard in front of the theatre.
A c.1968 photo featuring the new marquee taken by Tom Gray. It's in the Jack Tillmany collection.
A 1976 photo by Tom Gray from the Jack Tillmany collection.
More information: See many photos on Calisphere of various productions staged at the Great Star. The site Cinema Treasures has a page about the theatre. The Cinema Tour page on the Great Star has some 2005 and 2007 exterior views. The Yelp page on the theatre has photos and some discussion.
Chinese films and moviegoing in Chinatown are elegantly discussed in Arthur Dong's 2019 book "Hollywood Chinese: the Chinese in American Feature Films." He's also the author of the book "Forbidden City U.S.A: Chinatown Nightclubs 1936-1970." It's available on Amazon. Also available is his 1989 documentary "Forbidden City USA."
Also see Kim Fahlstedt's "Chinatown Film Culture: The Appearance of Cinema in San Francisco's Chinese Neighborhood," a 2020 book from Rutgers University Press. It's available on Amazon and there's a preview on Google Books.
Ruby Yang's 2010 documentary "A Moment in Time" tells the story of Chinese residents of San Francisco by discussing the movies they watched in Chinatown's theatres.
Jack Tillmany's Arcadia Publishing book "Theatres of San Francisco" can be previewed on Google Books. It's available from Amazon or your local bookseller.
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Thanks for the wonderful photos! A history of the Great China Theater can be found in the book, Chinatown Opera Theater in North America. Parts of it is available on Google Books.
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