If you had tickets for a movie tonight or were planning to see something at Alamo Drafthouse in the Mission today, you may be out of luck as the theater is temporarily closed pending an SFFD inspection on Monday.
A small electrical fire on Sunday morning led to an evacuation and temporary closure at the popular theater. As the theater announced on Twitter on Sunday, the culprit was "a set of back-up batteries that are in the process of being replaced" in the theater's emergency-lighting system. It was, they said, an isolated incident that caused minimal damage, but now they have to prove to the Fire Department that all hazardous smoke residue has been removed from the premises.
"Tickets for upcoming shows have been taken off-sale and will be posted as soon as we have clearance," the theater said, and anyone holding tickets can just reach out for a refund.
If you have tickets for today, please contact us at https://t.co/NKwViffFJy
— Alamo San Francisco (@DrafthouseSF) August 18, 2019
SFGate first caught the news Sunday, and they spoke to theater creative manager Jake Isgar, who said, "Lingering smoke and clean-up will likely have us closed for the rest of the day and likely into tomorrow morning. We'll message out via our social channels when we're back in action."
As of Monday afternoon at 2 p.m., Alamo Drafthouse SF's Twitter account had not yet provided an update.
The theater is currently showing Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood in 70mm (SFist recommends it!), as well as the new Cate Blanchett comedy Where'd You Go, Bernadette? But ticket sales remain suspended for all shows.
Update: The theater reopened at 2:30 p.m. Monday, and they're processing refunds for Sunday and Monday morning, albeit slowly.
Hey everyone!
— Alamo San Francisco (@DrafthouseSF) August 19, 2019
As of 2:30pm this afternoon, we're back open. Tickets are now on-sale for tonight's shows. Thank you all for the well wishes and kind words as our team worked to get us back up and running.