He believes the last time he was at the movies was at AMC Bay Street in Emeryville to see The Addams Family in 2019. The last time she was at the movies was in May for “A Night Celebrating Oakland’s Filmmakers” at the Grand Lake Theater, where some of her friends screened their films.Ĭouncilmember Kevin Jenkins is one councilmember who hasn’t fallen for the “Barbenheimer” craze and won’t be watching either of the films. Still, she’s looking forward to watching Barbie. She last movie she watched was The Wisdom of Trauma at the New Parkway Theater as part of an event there put on by MISSSEY, a local organization supporting Black survivors of sexual exploitation.Ĭouncilmember Janani Ramachandran told The Oaklandside via text that she “unfortunately” did not go to the movies this weekend. In an email statement, Councilmember Nikki Fortunato Bas said now that the City Council is on recess, she looks forward to watching more movies at the Grand Lake Theatre. “But we want theaters to thrive, and as long as they’re showing good films, they are going to thrive.” I’m not sure that we’ll go into a crowded movie theater anytime soon,” he said. “I’m sure we’ll be going to the theater sometime this summer.”īesides having a busy schedule, Kalb said he hasn’t felt entirely ready to be indoors in a packed theater. “It was nostalgic to go back to a drive-in,” he said. During the pandemic, he also paid a visit to the West Wind Solano Drive-In in Concord. He also said he hasn’t been out to see a movie since 2021, when he attended the Jewish Film Institute’s Winter Fest at Fort Mason in San Francisco. Mayor Sheng Thao told the Oaklandside via Pati Navalta, her communications chief, that she didn’t watch either of the films this weekend.Ĭouncilmember Dan Kalb told us via phone that he didn’t get to go to the movies this weekend but looks forward to watching Oppenheimer. Councilmembers Rebecca Kaplan, Carroll Fife, Noel Gallo, and Treva Reid did not return our request for comment. We contacted the mayor and councilmembers to see if they’d visited a local movie theater last weekend and received responses from several. But electeds watch movies too, so we decided to reach out to see if they’ve also caught on to the latest film phenomenon. Normally when our newsroom reaches out to elected officials, it’s to ask them about the city budget or have them remark on a contentious issue having to do with housing, the police, or our public schools. Credit: Amir Aziz What’s City Hall watching? “The director tapped into that pulse that the young people need to go back to the movie theater.” Thanks to the Barbie movie, the Grand Lake theater had its best weekend since Black Panther premiered five years ago. It created a whole upbeat mood,” she said. “There was an upbeat rhythm to Barbie that we haven’t seen in movies. Michaan’s wife, Yvette Michaan, also hopes that the excitement from the weekend changes the tides. Over at Grand Lake, Michaan said it was the “best weekend we’ve had since Black Panther premiered five years ago.” He hopes it’s the beginning of more people coming to the New Parkway. “That was challenging, operationally.”ĭespite the delays, Caesar is grateful for the enthusiasm Barbie fans brought to the theater. It felt like we were stretched very thin on many occasions,” he said. “We’re probably 90% of where we want to be staffing-wise. The sold-out shows caused long lines at the concessions and long waits to get food delivered to customers inside the theater, something that Caesar concedes is “not how the experience at the theater should be.” He said the last time the theater had similar crowds was when Wakanda Forever premiered last November. Ceasar declared it was “the busiest weekend ever in the history of the theater.” The New Parkway screened Barbie in one of its two theater rooms over the weekend-it showed other films and the women’s World Cup in the other-with all but one of the Barbie showings selling out from Thursday through Sunday.
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