What is the best San Francisco TV show of all time?
Chronicle Culture Critic Peter Hartlaub recently rediscovered what he says is the best, the short-lived 'Midnight Caller,' which followed a cop-turned-late-night-radio-host as he offered talk therapy to the Bay Area over the air waves and solved a crime or two.
Now, we're looking for Chronicle readers' picks. Choose your favorite scripted series set in San Francisco from the list below and tell us why it deserves the crown.
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San Francisco Chronicle
6 hours ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Kimchi, burrito bowls, KFC: People love sneaking food into movie theaters. Here's why you should stop
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.'
San Francisco Chronicle
a day ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
‘Eden' director Ron Howard talks George Lucas' influence, rediscovering acting and ‘getting the hell out'
Ron Howard grew up in Hollywood as a child star, but he became an adult on the streets of Petaluma while he was filming George Lucas ' 1973 ensemble piece 'American Graffiti.' 'For me it was literally a coming of age story,' Howard told the Chronicle in a video interview. 'That was the first project where I didn't have to have an on-set welfare worker and I didn't need parental supervision. So it was literally my first time away from home. 'I tried to sneak into some clubs in (San Francisco) and got thrown out within seconds. But it was an amazing adventure. It was definitely a pivotal, transformative moment for me.' Howard, a child star on 'The Andy Griffith Show' and later a regular on 'Happy Days,' said he was inspired by 'American Graffiti' producer Francis Ford Coppola and writer-director Lucas and would soon turn to directing himself. Now 71, Howard, an Oscar winner for 'A Beautiful Mind' (2001), is back with his first feature film in three years, 'Eden,' based on the true story of a group of German idealists who moved to Floreana, a deserted island in the Galapagos, to escape the chaos of post-World War I Europe. It opens in theaters Friday, Aug. 22. The director of films such as 'Cocoon,' ' Apollo 13 ' and ' Solo: A Star Wars Story ' admits the film is a tonal departure for him; it is perhaps his bleakest movie. To tell the story, Howard turned to screenwriter Noah Pink, with whom he collaborated on the Albert Einstein episodes of the National Geographic series 'Genius,' and an all-star cast led by Jude Law, Vanessa Kirby, Daniel Brühl, Sydney Sweeney and Ana de Armas. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity. Q: This doesn't seem like a Ron Howard-type movie. A: I acted with Henry Fonda in a television series that nobody knows about, nor should they, because it was pretty bad, called 'The Smith Family,' when I was 15, 16 years old. He was really the first voice of the industry that encouraged me to be a filmmaker. He was looking at my short films and reading the little scripts that I'd written, and he said, 'If you don't take a big creative risk every year and a half or two, you're not servicing your talent or the audience or the medium that you love.' Q: So then obviously, when you were filming 'American Graffiti,' you were already thinking of becoming a director? A: Yeah. My real common ground with George Lucas, who was in those days very withdrawn and quiet but a very nice guy, but we connected because I'd already been accepted to USC film school (Lucas' alma mater) and I was probably one of the few cast members who had seen the 'THX 1138' short. I had read about Lucas in a collection of interviews by Joseph Gelmis, who was a film critic at the time, called 'Film Director as Superstar' (1970). Francis Coppola was in it, there was a picture of him holding a handheld 16mm camera or an ARRI or something, and he mentioned George at the end of his interview. (Coppola) said, 'Independent filmmaking is gonna be very exciting. And I've been working with this young filmmaker out of USC. His film 'THX 1138' is fantastic.' So it was the beginning of the idea of a kind of an American independent film culture. Q: 'Eden' may be set around 1930, but it has appeal to a lot of modern people who might dream of deactivating all social media accounts and moving to a deserted island. A: 'Off the grid' is one of the most searched terms, so it's always been a big idea. I think one of the reasons that these three groups were German was that not only were they facing this horrible aftermath of World War I and the hopelessness of oppression and the autocracy that was filling the void in ways that were frightening, but also the book 'Robinson Crusoe' was this cultural event at the time. So that idea of getting the hell out and finding a desert island and making a go of it was a romantic one. Dr. Ritter (Law) and Dora (Kirby) were this Adam and Eve, and they became pop icons in German media and then later the U.S. as well. Q: How did you hear about the story, and what was the appeal for you? A: About 15 years ago I was on a vacation with the family in the Galapagos, a place I'd always wanted to go, and had been to Floreana, and I heard about a mystery and a twisted story of people coming into conflict. They had a museum about the Galapagos, and they had a whole room dedicated to this (story) and a lot of images, some of which we use at the end of the movie. Q: What's the most glaringly obvious mistake these people made? A: That the whole notion of running away from society and rediscovering yourself only to recognize that you are part of society. Your humanity is part of what you're trying to run away from. Q: Sydney Sweeney is great in this movie. Any take on the American Eagle jeans commercial controversy? A: I have no opinion about it. (Laughs and shakes head). I'm doing a documentary right now about the photographer, Richard Avedon, and so we have a segment about the (1980s) Brooke Shields (Calvin Klein) jeans ad. But I haven't been paying any attention to the controversy. I don't really even understand it. Q: Do you ever see yourself retiring? A: No, I don't. That's the beauty of this kind of business. My father (Rance Howard) acted until the day before he was stricken and lapsed into a coma, and he was 89. I look at Clint Eastwood and Scorsese and Ridley Scott and they're doing fine work. So if my health holds, I'm loving the process. Q: You appeared as yourself in the Apple TV+ series ' The Studio ' earlier this year. Could we see more of you in front of the camera? A: I could see myself trying to do a little acting again. That was the first time I really had to do any acting in decades where I really learned a lot of lines, even though I played myself. I really enjoyed it.
New York Post
2 days ago
- New York Post
Fisherman stunned to reel in giant, rare sea creature in viral video: ‘WTF is that!?'
It was the belle of the slime-ball. A fisherman — who happens to be a woman — elicited eeews and aaahs online after catching a mondo 11-pound sea slug off the coast of South Korea, which she captured in a video with 20 million views online. 'We have never seen such a huge one,' Tatiana Lyu, the angler who bagged the mammoth mollusk last month, told Jam Press. She and her crew had reportedly sunk a bait bag and were reeling it in when they noticed the supersize slimebag clinging to the end of the line. 3 'We have never seen such a huge one,' exclaimed Tatiana Lyu. Jam Press/@ramenka__busan 3 Some guessed the critter (pictured) was a sea hare, a giant herbivorous sea snail. Jam Press/@ramenka__busan In the footage, the team is seen pulling in the line with the gargantuan gastropod hanging on, causing bystanders to shriek in surprise like something out of a sci-fi thriller. The peculiar quarry made waves online with one viewer likening it to 'whale vomit.' 'That looks nasty and slimy. Barf,' exclaimed another, while a third wrote, 'WTF is that?' 3 The creature was released unharmed into the deep. Jam Press/@ramenka__busan 'You just KNOW they're gonna eat it!' fretted another. Thankfully, the sea slug was released unharmed to the ocean. The species of slug is unclear, although many guessed it was type a of sea hare, a species of marine snail with an internal shell that resides in shallow water and feeds on seaweed. The largest of the species — and largest gastropod on Earth — is the California black sea hare, which has been known to grow over 3 feet long and weigh almost 30 pounds. Speaking of Martian-looking denizens of the deep, a Russian fisherman made a splash in February after sharing footage of a bizarre, bulbous sea creature that viewers have compared to an 'alien.' The Lovecraftian critter was identified as a smooth lumpsucker, a species of marine ray-finned fish that grows to over a foot long and resides in the depths. Beachcombers in Oregon were freaked out in May after stumbling across a toothsome sea monster known as a Longnose Lancetfish due to its spearlike body.
