Alamo Drafthouse to open its two largest theaters in the Bay Area
Monsters and robots are invading the South Bay. But don't be alarmed — it's part of the largest expansion in the 28-year history of the Alamo Drafthouse.
The Austin-based dine-in movie theater chain, acquired last year by Sony Pictures, is scheduled to open venues at San Antonio Center in Mountain View on Monday, June 16, and at Westfield Valley Fair in Santa Clara on June 23.
Each will debut with three 'training days' to get staff acclimated. The soft opening features 25% off food and nonalcoholic beverages.
The first week's lineup at each theater includes big summer movies such as ' How to Train Your Dragon, 'Elio,' '28 Years Later,' ' Materialists,' 'F1' and 'M3gan 2.0,' as well as special programming. Tickets are on sale now at drafthouse.com/sf. (Pro tip: To find your desired theater location, you must first select which movie you want to see — the easiest way is to click on the calendar.)
Opening day at Mountain View includes a sing-along movie party of ' Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping ' (2016), which features Berkeley natives Andy Samberg, Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone, aka the Lonely Island.
Alamo, which now has three Bay Area locations after opening San Francisco's New Mission location a decade ago, is taking over theaters previously operated by ShowPlace Icon, which closed both venues last summer after its parent company, Kerasotes Theatres, shut down after 115 years in business.
The new theaters will become the largest in the chain's history. The Valley Fair location (2855 Stevens Creek Blvd., Suite 2160) occupies 62,228 square feet on two levels, while its Mountain View space (2575 California St., Suite 99), takes up 50,700 square feet on two levels. Each has 10 screens, with the biggest three featuring Barco 4K laser projection with Dolby Atmos audio.
'We see a ton of potential in these spaces,' said John Smith, Alamo's West Coast marketing director during a preview at the Mountain View location last month. 'We know we've got a mix that works, and we know that we understand this market from our experience in San Francisco, and that we can really elevate the bones of what was set up here into something pretty special.'
About those monsters and robots. Alamo Drafthouse is famed for decorating its theater lobbies with specially themed displays attached to special programming — the New Mission currently has ' The Phoenician Scheme Immersive Experience,' in celebration of Wes Anderson's latest movie, through June 20.
Mountain View will be decked out in a robotics-themed design, complete with a specialty bar called Dumbots, and include programming such as James Cameron's ' Terminator ' films, Stanley Kubrick's ' 2001: A Space Odyssey ' and 'Dr. Strangelove,' as well as other classics such as ' Blade Runner,' ' Alphaville ' and ' WarGames.'
Meanwhile, Japanese kaiju monsters will greet moviegoers at Valley Fair, which is scheduled to feature four weeks of Toho classics that include 'Destroy All Monsters,' 'Godzilla vs. Hedorah,' 'Gamera: Super Monster' and 'Mothra.'
'We definitely want to just throw some stuff on the wall and see what sticks and see if the audience is responsive,' said Jake Isgar, Alamo's head of alternative and specialty programming. 'We also want to explore what's worked in this market, like South Asian cinema — Telugu, Hindi and Bollywood cinema.'
Scott Dunaway, who helped set up Valley Fair and ran Mountain View while with ShowPlace ICON, returns as Mountain View general manager for Alamo. He expects the South Bay locations to be popular for private events as well.
'We do events all the time in San Francisco,' said Dunaway, who has been in the industry for 33 years. 'Even in a slow month, we might do eight to 10 events ranging from a $3,000 event up to a $70,000 event, depending on what the client needs. That's all going to be available here and we're gonna be able to do it on a large scale.'
To handle all this, the two theaters combined will provide up to 350 jobs. Hiring for both theaters continues at careers.drafthouse.com.
The staff buildout comes after Alamo announced layoffs across the chain in January.
At last month's preview event, it was stressed that Alamo was determined to get both theaters open for what could be a bounce-back box office summer, and that while both are scheduled to open at venue capacity and with a full kitchen and bar — including 24 beers on tap — there will be ongoing remodeling and tweaking through the end of the year.
'We want people to come in and feel like it's more than just watching a movie,' said Mike Sampson, Alamo's director of field marketing. 'Obviously we have our bar and we have a full menu but then also we get to do really fun new and different things.'
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