Kimchi, burrito bowls, KFC: People love sneaking food into movie theaters. Here's why you should stop

San Francisco Chronicle​

a day ago

Bottles of wine. Chipotle burrito bowls. Entire buckets of Kentucky Fried Chicken.
Bay Area movie theater owners and managers have some wild stories about things patrons have snuck into cinemas — whether it's because of seemingly high prices, the thrill of breaking the rules or just someone's twisted and very specific desire to eat a Taco Bell Crunchwrap Supreme while watching 'Sinners.'
'I'll catch them with drinks or snacks, and I'm like, 'Really?'' Buck says. 'If you bring your own bowl to our theater, it costs $4 to fill it with popcorn. And you can bring a really big bowl.'
Chronicle restaurant critic MacKenzie Chung Fegan recently wrote about the strange trend of people bringing outside food into restaurants — a masterful exploration of the social contract with a side of egg salad. It got me thinking about my personal red line: Never bring outside food into an independent movie theater.
My hatred of outside food in the theater solidified during my 18 years as a Chronicle movie critic, when I would often go to advance screenings, filled by people who won radio contests. As if the free tickets weren't enough, many brought their own full dinners. (I'll never forget the woman who pulled out a Ziploc bag full of kimchi, and as the lights went down, started eating it with her fingers.)
The concession stand prices can seem to justify the crime. The AMC Metreon in San Francisco sells a large popcorn for $11.79. Red Vines are $6.99, more than triple the cost of an identical box an escalator ride away at Target.
(Independent theaters often have better deals, like the Cameo's bring-your-own-bowl $4 popcorn special. The Grand Lake Theater's popcorn prices range from $5 to $7, with real butter.)
Truth be told, I hauled a Matson cargo ship worth of candy into theaters as a child, and in college wore a trenchcoat in summer weather so I could smuggle burritos for me and two friends into 'Days of Thunder' at the Fremont Theatre in San Luis Obispo. Let he who is free of Skittles in his pockets cast the first stone …
And yet as a journalist, I've written too many stories about historic Bay Area theaters going full 'The Last Picture Show' and closing forever. Others seek non-profit models, GoFundMe campaigns and personal debt to stay afloat. If you love movies this should feel personal. And when it feels personal, paying $6.50 for a diet soda should feel less like robbery and more like a carbonated civic act.
My first call is to Allen Michaan, who owns the Grand Lake Theater in Oakland and has been managing theaters since Aug. 16, 1972, when he took over the Rialto in Berkeley.
'The food subsidizes the operations of the theater,' Michaan begins, before giving a lesson in cinema economics.
Theaters give between 50% and 65% of ticket sales back to the studio, with the blockbuster films that fill theaters all summer usually on the higher end of that range. And some studio films require a minimum length in theaters. If they bomb, theater owners are stuck with near-empty rooms.
'The remainder (of ticket revenue) is not enough to cover the operations of the theater,' Michaan said. 'We absolutely rely on the food sales to get us into the black.'
For Cameo-owner Cathy Buck, being in the center of Wine Country has meant Wine Country problems.
'Before we had our beer and wine license, we used to have full wine bottles all the time in the theater,' she said.
Michaan's darkest years just passed. For decades, a KFC was across the alley from his theater. 'We used to have people try to sneak in Kentucky Fried Chicken, which was always smelly and a mess,' he said. 'Thankfully the chicken place isn't next to the Grand Lake any more. Now it's a Starbucks.'
When considering outside food, I place the corporate multiplexes in a different category. What you do there is between you and your god.
But everyone I've met who runs an indie movie theater is hustling, and no one is getting rich. Michaan lost money on the Grand Lake for years — I wrote about it in 2010 — subsidizing the theater with his successful auction and antiques fair businesses. If there's an owner who is using those $6 boxes of Junior Mints to fund a stable of race horses, I haven't met her yet.
However, one recent trend is combatting the outside food urges: better movie theater menus.
The Alameda Theatre near my home partners with the adjacent Cinema Grill to offer movie-themed food and drink specials that align with what's playing. (Currently serving: 'The Human Torch,' a Fireball/Rumchata drink for the new 'Fantastic Four' movie.)
The Balboa and 4-Star in San Francisco, both run by Cinema SF, have better beer selections than some local bars. The New Mission in San Francisco and New Parkway in Oakland have particularly robust menus; the Parkway's Peruvian tacos with slow-roasted pork and a pineapple-cabbage slaw are the best thing I've consumed in a movie theater.
Buck offers her foodie clientele all-local fare, including partnerships with wineries, two different chocolatiers and two companies providing gelato. Her plans for the new 'Downton Abbey' movie out next month are a galaxy away from the Dune popcorn bucket.
'We're serving bubbles, English breakfast tea, both hot and cold, two kinds of tea sandwiches and two kinds of scones,' Buck said. 'We only have five seats left.'
And though theater owners would prefer you hit the concession stand, they also say they're not aggressive about enforcing the outside food policy. 'We're not a police state about it,' Michaan said.
In fact his biggest outside food problem, decades ago at a theater in Menlo Park, came from a manager who took the policy too strictly, at one point interrogating a couple with a small child.
'She made them pour out the formula in the baby's bottle, because it was outside food,' Michaan said. 'And I fired her! I mean, it's possible to take these things too far.'