For those of you participating in Sunday's Gay Freedom Day 1978 recreation for the filming of Milk, let the above inspire you. SFist reader Richard scanned and sent in his vintage Castro Street Fair 1978 shirt, which is downright adorable and loads more creative than the rainbow-saturated gear you see nowadays during Pride season. Thanks, Richard!......

Although most of us are giddy that Hollywood has come to our little town to film a moving picture show, others are less than gay about it. Namely, a few Castro merchants who have seen business drop since production began late last month. According to the BAR: "It has really impeded on my business. We are losing $400 to $500 a day," said Cecil Russell, the owner of Always Tan Skin and Body at......

Undergoing a procedure to erase 30 years from its face, the Castro neighborhood is going retro, circa 1978, for the filming of Gus Van Sant's Harvey Milk biopic, Milk, which starts shooting this week. Already the Castro Theatre, right, and boutique shop Given, formerly Milk's camera store / campaign headquarters, are being renovated to get that '70s vibe. Rumor has it that Castro Street between 18th and 19th streets (i.e., the staphicenter) will be......

Andy at Towleroad sent us this update on the magnificent, color-blasted mural over at Given, which used to be Castro Camera, Harvey Milk's former headquarters/living space. (Why, we were just there the other day to find those poo & pee dolls for a friend's one-year-old. We completely failed to notice this piece going up.) Given's owner, Nick Romero, commissioned this mural for his store to memorialize the slain city supervisor. (Other than a sidewalk......

Even though we're too vile to appear on screen in a film about his life, legacy, and popper sniffing -- no, we will not let it go, but thank you for asking -- we will honor the guy who was once known as the Mayor of Castro Street: former San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk. Sure, some of the Castro's sex shops have removed phallic symbols from their storefront windows in order to protect the......

-- Built in 1911, the Tower Theater is up for sale. Again. [Curbed SF] -- Fatal Bayview fire still under investigation. [SF Examiner] -- Jew's attorney asks, "More time, please?" Look, the only kind of time that will help Ed's case is a time machine. Thank you, good night! [SFGate] -- The new Mint. (Also, a museum? Yawn.) [Transbay Blog] -- Milk vs. The Mayor of Castro Street. Me-ow! [ASD] -- Hit-and-run suspect snagged.......

No, not really. But that would be some party if they were. We received these images from the editor's inbox this afternoon, taken at Castro and 18th Street (the epicenter of Halloween's past). It looks like some sort of PG&E nonsense. Waiting until after Halloween might have been a better time to cut large, grave-like holes into Castro Street. We're just saying. SFist thanks you, Larry, for the pics!......

Photo from last year's Halloween in the Castro...

San Francisco and the Bay Area are getting ready to throw a big (albeit somewhat belated) celebration for Philip Glass’ 70th birthday with concerts all over the place and, of course, the premier of Glass’ new opera Appomattox. And the kick-off is this Friday night with a very special and rare intimate recital courtesy of San Francisco Performances. Mr. Glass will be playing several of his pieces with cellist Wendy Sutter and percussionist Mick Rossi at Herbst Theater....

Local movie star, sometimes activist, and Tosca regular Sean Penn will play gay for pay in the long-incubated version of Randy Shilts' 1982 "The Mayor of Castro Street". (An amazing book for those of you who have yet to read it.) He'll play murdered San Francisco Supervisor and gay rights activist Harvey Milk, who was shot and killed along with Mayor George Moscone by Supervisor Dan White. Perma-boy Matt Damon gets to play the......

Kathy Griffin seems to prefer the techie geeks. (And just who wouldn't?) According to le Hilton, Kathy Griffin is dating Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak. (Yay! It's nice to see a redhead making good.) Is this true? Are they really spooning each other? We have no idea. But it'd be nice to see Griffin frolicking around the Castro again. Lord knows the strip needs something to keep it queer and interesting. (Assuming Wozniak lives in......

-- SF Macarons versus Macaroons. [Gridskipper] -- East Bay movie studio/shopping center deal? Fin. [Chron] -- #70: Early morning Hunters Point murder. [SF Crime] -- Lawsuit over AT&T Wireless' ability to suck. [Examiner] -- OMG: High School Musical 2 premieres tonight! (It seems Zac Efron's a huge Giants fan. And probably a Castro Street fan, too. What?) [Chron] -- Sierra Nevada Brewing Company executive's body found in Sacto River. [Chron] -- Patti Smith singing......

Okay, so nobody ever accused us of being especially observant, but we only recently recognized that "Naia", at 451 Castro Street, was a gelateria. See, the sign only says the name, and there's no logo of an ice cream cone or anything . . . we'd always assumed it was some sort of minimalist modern art gallery. On Sunday, we saw a few people outside eating frozen treats, and the lightbulb went off. We went in, and made pigs of ourselves. The first thing that hit us was the presentation: dozens of flavors of gelato, sorbretto, and soy gelato, vividly displayed in a glass case--a visual treat....

Remember how effed-up Muni was at last year's Bay to Breakers, with no signs and riders vomiting and drivers getting lost and nobody having any idea how to get anywhere? Yeah, it's probably going to be rough this year, too. (The race is on Sunday, the 20th.) We've got some reasons to be scared, very scared, but also some tips for avoiding the worst of it. Muni promises to be doing their best to keep......

On our tightly-packed MUNI ride to the Castro to the opening night festivities for the San Francisco International Asian-American Film Festival, we were squooshed next to three thrilled Asian-American film lovers eagerly listing all the movies they were planning on seeing over this week. Excitement is running high! The SFIAAFF opening night screening was for Finishing the Game, a faux-documentary comedy about the casting of a replacement Bruce Lee to finish Lee's last movie......

Last week's winner, the SF Weekly: Those of you longing for less Newsom news, the Weekly is your place! It's an entirely Ruby Tourk-free issue (except for the first two paragraphs of Matt Smith, at which point he then changes the subject entirely to talk some more about the city golf courses). More letters about Jade-Blue Eclipse. Has Nancy Pelosi had a facelift? People upset about the increase in fees for a state medical marijuana......

We meant to post on this yesterday but the afternoon kind of got away from us (thank goodness today's Veterans' Day! Thank you, veterans!). An electrical short near the Castro Street MUNI station disabled all the K, L, and M MUNI streetcar lines for three hours yesterday afternoon. They got it fixed around 4, so the afternoon commute wasn't as bad as it could have been. MUNI spokesperson Maggie Lynch apologizes. There's an investigation underway......

Hey, isn't it a bit early for horror and blood? ...

Did you know there's fifteen people running for three seats on the school board this election cycle? That's almost like a District 5 election! How will you figure out who to vote for (besides just blindly voting the Bay Guardian ticket, that is)? Never fear -- SFist has bravely gone out and contacted all the candidates, and, much like we did for District 6, we've sent them all the same interview questions and will run......

So MUNI claims that your morning commute from the Sunset should be okay today, after yesterday's debacle in the Twin Peaks tunnel. Turns out there was indeed a derailment (of an L train, at 7:50 a.m.) in the tunnel, and the initial reports of an electrical problem were incorrect. Also, it turns out that this was the second derailment on MUNI in seven days. Where was the first derailment? According to MUNI spokesman Alan Siegel......

District Five Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi accomplished something momentous Friday night; not only did he manage to convince us to travel down to City Hall for the first time since we spent four hours trying to register a business name (all the good ones are taken by the way), he brought back former Supervisor and slain gay rights legend, Harvey Milk as well. Contrary to what you might be thinking, Mirkarimi has not discovered a rift......

Hey, where's Nedra Ruiz these days? Police are reporting that the man who caused the horrific Castro car fires last week may have suffered a seizure while driving down the Castro Street hill. He was still driving, even though he'd had a seizure three months earlier. That's really not good. Police haven't named him, but ID him as a 50-year old wine merchant from Paso Robles. Angry young Yusef Bey IV of Your Black Muslim......

As if SFPD police spokesman Sgt. Neville Gittens's day wasn't bad enough with the Castro car fires -- about an hour before Castro Street went up in flames, someone walked into a crowded community center gym in the Western Addition, where up to 50 people were playing basketball, and shot a part-time employee of the center to death. On the footage we saw of this on the news, poor Gittens had clearly been called in on his day off to respond to the first shooting, and then had to run over to the Castro 30 minutes later; you could see him visibly aging on screen. In South City, two guys held up a pizza deliveryman, but panicked when they saw cars driving by. They grabbed the pizza but left all the cash. And people in Burlingame are getting exercised about a recent lowering of the speed limit from 35 mph to 30 on California Drive between Burlingame Avenue and Murchison, with scads of people calling into City Hall to complain. Must be nice living in Burlingame! Turns out the speed limit was lowered because the average speed on the road has dropped to around 30 mph. The Burlingame city manager is now telling everyone that they won't get tickets if they drive 35 mph on that section. ...

The cops have arrested a man wanted for slipping Rohypnol into a woman's drink at a bar located on the 200 block of Castro Street in Mountain View. The woman, who had drunk an unattended drink at the bar, came to as she was being assaulted by a "chubby" white man in his 20s in the backseat of a car. The man was arrested without incident at a San Jose Sharks game. You know how when you're a hammer, everything looks like a nail? Yesterday, the SFPD blew up yet another "supicious package" they thought was a bomb. The streets around Post and Taylor were blocked off for about two hours as the package was blown up. The cops are still investigating whether it was a real bomb or not. And the Lake Merritt Bakery and Restaurant in Oakland will be closed as its owners recover from a two-alarm blaze Thursday morning. The fire started on the roof, and they think it might have been electrical. The owners are going to repair the place, and then they're hoping to open 24 hours a day. (We're always in favor of more 24 hour places in the area!) The owners hope that the remaining roof rafters will be strong enough to hold up its iconic red MERRITT sign. ...

We are hopelessly addicted to Peaches Christ. The performer, filmmaker, movie curator, and cult mastermind is like San Francisco's own walking version of the Rocky Horror Picture Show: a strange, acerbic, glamorously aggressive drag queen protectress. Best known for her Midnight Mass series, her cable access show, and her occasional hosting of at Trannyshack, Ms. Christ (along with her dapper alter-ego, Joshua Grannell) has compiled four of her excellent horror films -- "Season of......