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No landmark designation for Castro Theater seats

 The Castro Theatre's iconic neon at night
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The Castro Theatre in San Francisco.

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to landmark some parts of the Castro Theatre’s interior, but the orchestra-level seats were not among them. The seats have become a major point of contention since Another Planet Entertainment — the live events company best known for the Outside Lands festival — announced its plans to renovate the theater.

Movie theater advocates and cultural organizations banded together to form the Friends of the Castro Theatre Coalition – which has been fighting Another Planet’s proposed changes. The group has argued that the seats are historically significant and essential to the moviegoing experience.

Supervisor Rafael Mandelman, who represents the Castro neighborhood, wrote on Twitter that he is not comfortable “relitigat[ing] merits of APE’s project” through the landmarking process. Mandelman emphasized that he does not want the theatre to remain shuttered indefinitely.

Supervisors Ahsha Safaí, Catherine Stefani, Matt Dorsey, Joel Engardio, and Myrna Melgar joined Mandelman in voting against landmarking the seats. Supervisors Dean Preston, Shamann Walton, Connie Chan, and Aaron Peskin voted in favor.

Max Harrison-Caldwell is a summer intern at KALW and a student at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, where he is studying audio reporting and photojournalism. Before going back to school, he covered streets and public space for The Frisc. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, the Boston Globe, and Thrasher Magazine.