Mission Mission

[file photo by Ariel]

As a passionate theater and event-goer, Brittany went to a forum on the future of SF’s nightlife amid recent closings due to economic and cultural shifts in the city, as well as neighbor complaints. Here’s her report:

[file photo by Ariel]

People are moving into cities for a reason. We endure small apartments, high prices and the discomfort of living on top of each other to gain access to the inspiration and entertainment that comes with being surrounded by crazy creative people. Arts and culture are the lifeblood of what makes any city unique, particularly San Francisco.

I review theater here because I want to shine a light on one element of what makes our city so great (even if I don’t always love what I see). So when I heard CMAC (California Music and Culture Association) was hosting a “Supervisor Nightlife and Entertainment Forum” allowing Supervisor candidates to “discuss their visions for the future of nightlife and culture in San Francisco.” I wanted to hear what they had to say.

[file photo by Ariel]

With the SF Bay Guardian closing announcement happening earlier in the day, the conversation about what will happen to SF if our arts and culture can’t make the rent seemed more urgent than ever. Which is why it was disconcerting that only three candidates — Supervisor Scott Weiner, Supervisor Jane Kim, and Juan-Antonio Carballo — out of six who were invited to participate even made it to the event.

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On last week’s Roll Over Easy my fellow Mission Mission contributors Luke and Chris talked about the joys of watching the Blue Angels buzz the city during Fleet Week. They pointed out that there are always complaints about the noise and rattling windows. But there have also been complaints about the cost. Last year KQED suggested that it costs about $1 million to fly the planes over SF. Luke and Chris thought they brought a lot of joy to people, with no specific cost to anyone who wanted to watch (excepting residents’ tax money). Beyond that, I would assume that they’re meant to sustain excitement and support for our military might and justify its spending.

[photo by John 'K']

Personally, I’ve never been a fan of the Angels. Their skill is impressive, but it’s not my thing, and I agree that the noise is annoying in that it’s not opt-in. So, I invite you here to speculate with me about what we could do with one million dollars that would still not really accomplish anything, but would bring joy to all kinds of people around the Bay Area, with no added cost to them.

What would you do? What would you like to see?

Here’s my stab at it: a life sized At-At standing with the Oakland cranes shooting It’s Its all over the Bay Area. Now, I know there are people out there who aren’t Star Wars fans (I’m not), and people who can’t tolerate ice cream (I can’t), but even so, how cool would this be??

Before we got a bunch of our friends together and built The Secret Alley, Noel Von Joo and I got a bunch of our friends together and spent a number of years making a strange post-zombie-apocalypse movie, When Gravity Changes. It’s about a loner who is stuck on his roof while zombies swarm beneath him, the sun has stopped rising and his only companion is a talking raccoon . . . until he finds a city of fetuses hidden in a tree. It was shot on a roof in Santa Cruz, an attic in Sacramento and a gutter on our very own Capp Street.

[Noel in the fetus city set]

The movie will be showing as part of Here & Far, curated by Sarah Flores, at The Roxie this Wednesday night. Our movie will follow a bunch of other local shorts, Vacation (2014) Written and Directed by Tracy Brown, As Long as There is Plenty (2013) Written and Directed by Kenneth Vaughn, Chaos Directed by Natalie Eakin, Bequeath the Heart By Zack Von Joo & Million Year Check-up By Davenzane Hayes.

The show starts at 7pm and The Roxie Theater is at 3117 16th St., near Valencia. You can purchase tickets in advance here.

Way back in ’08, when beloved longtime local news anchor Dennis Richmond was set to retire, everybody went nuts. We did a post about some portraits people had done to honor him, which led to our discovery of this gem on Flickr:

Such a great Dennis Richmond portrait — and itself just a killer photo, right!?

AND THEN, GET THIS, years later, I was partying at Thee Parkside and had a CHANCE ENCOUNTER with the two sisters in the photo! I couldn’t believe it! I told them what a big fan I was, we did some Jäger shots — and then we recreated the photo, with me as Dennis Richmond:

(I never posted about this development before, but I found this pic the other day while putting together my album of Mission Hill Saloon/Unresolved Love Life of Evelyn Lee memories.)

Dennis Richmond rules!

More or less trippy than a double-decker freeway cutting through Hayes Valley in the early ’90s?

[via Telstar Logistics]

UPDATE: Oh yeah, Bernalwood did a then-and-now post with this pic a few years back.

Some 30 years ago, your San Francisco forefathers deemed it necessary to protect the youth of tomorrow by limiting the number of pinball and arcade game and bingo games for money machines based on a business’ square footage or their proximity to schools. Presumably, they felt the change-powered entertainment craze would pluck quarters from the pockets of unsuspecting children and rot their tiny brains with too much Elvira and the Party Monsters. In other words, during the 80s the city decided to limit pinball machines in the same way we currently restrict where pot clubs can open and where the taco trucks can park. That anti-arcade legislation is expected to be revised today thanks to prevailing common sense and some hard working pro-pinball activists.

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Seen on 18th Street.

Probable Edweard Muybridge tribute, powered by wind.

3D City is a year long stereoscopic photography project by Doctor Popular

San Francisco’s “Swan” (or sometimes “Birdman”) can most often be found feeding the pigeons at 16th and Mission. Where he’s been hanging out and selling his daily newsletter’s for the last decade. Though he’s usually by himself, there’s been another dude that’s been joining him for about an hour a day to feed the pigeons. The two don’t talk much to each other, in fact I don’t think they even know each other’s names, though you can find them sitting by each other around noon at the 16th st BART.

If you see Swan, please consider donating a couple bucks for his most recent newsletter (or “rag” as he calls it), which features his own drawings, poetry, and ramblings.

[Most of these photos were taken on my old Nimslo 3D camera with Ilford HP5 film except for the wide shot above, which was done on my Lumix 3D1] More shots after the bump.
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The first bar I ever went to (besides with my dad as a kid) was the Uptown. It was a great experience, just what I always thought a bar would be like: Dark, damp and a little scary. I felt totally at home. Last week the owner, Scott Ellsworth, passed away unexpectedly from a heart attack. I didn’t know Scott that well, but the couple times we talked he was always really friendly, and very supportive of the weird artsy place my buddies and I were building across the street. He ran a bar that didn’t have a cocktail program or a dress code. He ran a bar where you could sit down, have a shot and a beer and chat with familiar regulars. Inside the Uptown I’ve stored paintings during a scavenger hunt art show, made business deals, broken up fights, maybe gotten in a fight, tried in vain to get up the nerve to talk to a girl, watched my team dominate the World Series, and seen Sean Penn close it down.

[via Facebook]

The Bold Italic has a great tribute to him today, which would have been his 60th birthday.

In 2011, when I posted a picture of “KiTOS”, the letters on the back of the bar, Scott wrote in to tell us that it stood for the previous owner’s names, Kim and Tony. Let’s just say now it stands for “Keep in Touch, Ol’ Scott.”